
Class ,h 3 2 

Book___ 

IV1 



SOME OF THE 



PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 



ON 



Socialism and Science, Religion, Ethics, 

Critique-of-Reason and the 

World-at-large. 



BY 

JOSEPH DIETZGEN. 

TRANSLATED BY M. BEER AND TH. ROTHSTEIN 



WITH A BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH AND SOME INTBODUCTOEY BBMABKS BY 
EUGENE DIETZGEN : TRANSLATED BY ERNEST UNTEBMANN. 



EDITED BY EUGENE DIETZGEN AND JOSEPH DIETZGEN. JB. 



CHICAGO 
CHARLES H. KERR & COMPANY 

1917 



"B 32.1 6 



Copyright 1906 
By Eugene Dietzgen 






TABLE OF CONTENTS 



PAGE 

Joseph Dietzgen : a Sketch of His Life by Eugene 

Dietzgen 7 

An Illustration of the Proletarian Method of Research 
and Conception of the World: Max Stirner and 

Joseph Dietzgen. By Eugene Dietzgen 35 

Scientific Socialism 79 

The Religion of Social-Democracy 90 

Ethics of Social-Democracy 155 

Social-Democratic Philosophy I . 173 

The Limits of Cognition 224 

Our Professors on the Limits of Cognition 236 

The Inconceivable: a Special Chapter in Social- Demo- 
cratic Philosophy 254 

Excursions of a Socialist into the Domain of Epistemology 

Preface 263 

I. " The Innermost of Nature No Created Mind Can 

Enter" 266 

II. The Absolute Truth and Its Natural Manifestations 278 

III. Materialism versus Materialism 291 

IV. Darwin and Hegel „ 314 

V. The Light of Cognition 342 



JOSEPH DIETZGEN 

A SKETCH OF HIS LIFE BY EUGENE DIETZGEN * 

My father, Joseph Dietzgen, was born in Blankenberg, 
near Cologne, Germany, on December 9, 1828. The 
place is a former stronghold of a robber baron, ro- 
mantically situated. A part of the walls and four massive 
ruins of towers of the old stronghold still lend a pic- 
turesque character to the landscape, the effect being 
heightened by the location of Blankenberg high upon a 
mountain covered with woods and vineyards, at the foot 
of which the Sieg, a charming tributary of the Rhine, 
winds its way. 

My grandfather, who was a well-to-do master tanner 
and a genuine little bourgeois, transferred his tannery, 
about the year 1835, to tne nearby village of Uckerath, 
a place of about four hundred inhabitants. It owed its 
relatively busy life to the fact that it was a relay station 
on the postal route between Francfort and Cologne, which 
was then much frequented. 

My father was the eldest of three brothers and two 
sisters and resembled more than any of them his mother, 
a woman of high endowment, who at the age of 74 still 
attracted attention by her beautiful and stalwart ap- 
pearance. The Dietzgen's were one of the oldest fam- 
ilies in the valley of the Sieg, and the chronicle of the 
county seat Siegburg mentions some Dietzgen's in the 

1 A revised and completed reproduction of an article in " Die Neue 
Zeit," 1894-95, Vol. II. 

7 



8 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

capacity of civil councillors and master tradesmen as far 
back as 1674. 

My father went to the public school in Uckerath, and 
later on for a short time to the high school in Cologne. 
He is described as being, up to his fifteenth year, an 
exceptionally bright boy, always up to some pranks and 
giving much trouble by his high spirits to the pastor, 
the mayor, and other prominent citizens of Uckerath and 
its neighborhood. For this reason, my grandfather sent 
him for a short while away from Uckerath to the Latin 
school of a very strict disciplinarian pastor in the village 
of Oberpleis. 

However, his years of adolescence and the awakening 
of love's longing made a thoughtful young man of him, 
who in the hours of recreation from tanning in grand- 
father's shop assiduously studied literature, political 
economy, and philosophy. He derived some inspiration 
from the companionship of a playmate of his childhood 
who attended the university at Bonn. 

In those days, 1 845-1 849, in the shop, where a book 
was generally found open by the side of his work, he 
also learned to read French fluently without a teacher 
and to speak it so well that in 1871, when French prison- 
ers of war were quartered in the town of Siegburg where 
we lived at that time, he was able to converse with them, 
while to my surprise the teachers of French in the 
preparatory college could not do so. A small number 
of poems of my father, dating from his period of adoles- 
cence, 1 847-1 85 1, were found among the papers left by 
him. I reproduce two of them herewith: 

THE PROLETARIAN. 

By chains of poverty my life is bound, 
And superstition's mists obscure my brain. 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 

The curse of toil, the never-ending strain, 
Oppresses me and weighs me to the ground. 

Made in a mould divine, yet I was found 
Amid the filthy garbage of a drain, 
The offspring of the outcast and profane, 

Doomed to the level of a soulless hound. 

A vagabond! Sufficient for my kind 

The beggar's meal, doled out from day to day 
With drops of hollow faith to ease my mind. 

Bear I my cross until this mortal clay 
Shall totter to its grave? Where will you fine* 
My soul? Where Satan holds eternal swayi 

HARD TIMES. 

Little woman, little song, 
Oh, I love you, love you long. 

— Fr. v. Schlegei 

In my good young days of gladness, 

When I felt my nature thrilling 
With creation's sweetest madness, 

Maidens fair were always willing, 
And there was no room for sadness. 

In my happy exultation, 
And 'mid kisses, songs, and dances, 

I defied with animation 
Care's and worry's darkest glances. 

Woe is me ! The tide has turned ! 

Times have changed. Now frank devotion, 

Tender glances, sweet embraces, 
Conjure up the marriage notion, 

Altar, wedding-ring, and laces, 
And a family commotion. 

Sadly do I face the question: 
Why is love abomination, 

Why a shame the sex suggestion, 



10 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Unless bless'd by rank and station? 
Woe is me! The tide has turned! 

Pretty maiden, bright and bonnie, 

Winsome, charming, blithe and rosy! 
If I only had the money 

For a homestead snug and cosy, 
You would be my bride, my honey! 

But, alas! though Cupid's craving 
Is as wild and strong as ever, 

Yet in vain is all my raving. 
Never shall I hold you, never! 

Woe is me! The tide has turned! 

At an early stage of his development, my father felt 
attracted toward Socialism — aside from the lesson? 
taught by the times and conditions in which he lived — ' 
by the study of the French economists ; the Communist 
Manifesto of Marx and Engels made a class-conscious 
socialist out of him in 1848. 

'He tried his hand at the trade of a " preacher of dis- 
content " in the " mad " year 1848, by addressing the 
peasants from a chair standing in the main street of the 
village. 

In June, 1849, tne reaction drove him to America, at 
the age of 21. There he worked for two years as 
journeyman tanner, painter and teacher, but only at 
intervals, spending most of his time as a so-called tramp 
without means, and walking, or riding on canal boats, 
over a large part of the United States, from Wisconsin 
in the North to the Gulf of Mexico in the South, and 
from the Hudson in the East to the Mississippi in the 
West. Apart from acquiring the English language, he 
regarded as the best result of these travels, as he wrote 
to me to New York in 1882, " the feeling of having be- 
come acquainted with a land and with conditions, where 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN II 

one can make light of the pressing care for the daily 
bread which weighs upon one so hard in Germany." 

In December, 1851, we again find him at work in 
grandfather's shop at Uckerath, and two years later he 
married a devoutly religious orphan from the little country 
town of Drolshagen in Westphalia. Her goodness of 
heart and love of life cheered him, until her death in 1877 
made him a widower. 

In spite of their utterly different mental propensities — 
my mother having the prejudiced bourgeois mind and 
being a devout Catholic, while my father was a thorough- 
going naturalist and proud of his proletarian convictions 
— they lived in rare harmony. 

It is significant for the relations of my parents that 
even after twenty-one years of union with my father, 
my mother urged me on the occasion of my first com- 
munion, which seemed to her an especially opportune 
moment, to send the fervent prayer to God that he might 
convert my father and lead him back into the embrace 
of the alone-saving church. Although this prayer re- 
mained unfulfilled, my father nevertheless occupied the 
place next to God in the devotion of my mother through- 
out all her life. 

Shortly after his marriage, my father opened a grocery 
store, a bakery, and a tannery combined in the nearby 
Winterscheid, much after the manner of the enterprising 
Americans. He was so successful in his business that he 
soon opened a branch store in the village of Ruppichte- 
roth. But as was his custom in Uckerath, so also in 
Winterscheid and in his later enterprises my father de- 
voted only half of the day to material gain, while the 
rest of his time was spent in diligent study, from pure 
thirst of knowledge and without other incentive. 

In order to secure economic independence for himself 



12 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

and to be enabled to devote himself entirely to science at 
an earlier date than would have been possible by the help 
of his country store, he again emigrated in 1859 to the 
United States, where he tried to establish a larger busi- 
ness in the South. But the Civil War breaking out soon 
after that, his business in Montgomery, Alabama, came 
to an end. One morning he found some of his friends 
strung up in front of their houses, because their sympathy 
for the North had become inconvenient to their neighbors. 
He left Alabama in 1861 and returned to the Rhine, 
where he took charge of grandfather's tannery which he 
operated, as the grandfather had done, with the occa- 
sional help of a day laborer. 

It happened one day that his eldest sister called his 
attention to an advertisement in the " Kolnische Zeitung," 
in which a man familiar with advanced methods of tan- 
ning was wanted for a large government tannery in St. 
Petersburg, Russia. My father applied for this position, 
and in the spring of 1864 the Russian counsellor of state, 
Goureaux, visited him in Uckerath and engaged him at a 
high salary. In a few years, my father succeeded in 
increasing the productivity of the establishment fivefold, 
by the introduction of improved machinery and methods. 
But in 1869 he was back once more in the Rhineland, 
this time at Siegburg, where he had inherited a tannery 
from one of his uncles. It was this inheritance, together 
with his desire for greater independence, and the political 
conditions of Russia, that induced him to leave St. Peters- 
burg. The administration regretted his departure and 
promised to continue his salary, if he would inspect the 
factory for a few months every year. My father visited 
St. Petersburg several times for this purpose, but later 
the administration decided to dispense with his costly 
services. 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 1 3 

During his sojourn in Russia, my father wrote his 
first work: The Nature of Hitman Brain Work, dis- 
cussed by a workingman. A renezved critique of pure 
and practical reason. This critique of reason first ap- 
peared in 1869, published by Otto Meissner in Hamburg. 
It contains for the careful reader, among other things, an 
epistemological confirmation and explanation of the con- 
sistency of the materialist conception of history, on the 
basis of the monist-naturalist theory of understanding; 
furthermore, the beginning of a dialectics developed be- 
yond Hegel and his successors, Feuerbach, Marx and 
Engels. 

However, Joseph Dietzgen formulated his discovery 
of a dialectics expanded into a cosmic-monistic philosophy 
more clearly and usefully in his " Positive Outcome of 
Philosophy " which appeared in 1894. In this work his 
dialectics is more definitely and perfectly elaborated, not 
only as the " science of the general movement and de- 
velopment of nature, of human society, and of thought " 
(Engels), not only as the science of the eternally change- 
able diffusion of things, the individual connections of 
which must be studied, but also as the science of the 
infinitely constant and monistic interrelation of all things 
in the universe. It was only by means of this perfection 
that dialectics could grow into a consistent monism, a 
uniform world philosophy. From this moment dates the 
discovery of a cosmic-dialectic method of thought which 
guarantees a strictly systematic and logical uniformity in 
the theory of all studies, no matter how wide and irrecon- 
cilable may seem the contradiction of the questions 
treated. This is the only method of research which ex- 
terminates dualism and superstition in all fields of studies, 
and clears the road for every science to its very last 
conclusions where each science merges into the universal 



14 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

interrelation of nature. These words may here suffice 
to indicate the principal accomplishment of Joseph 
Dietzgen. 

In St. Petersburg, he also wrote his articles on " Cap- 
ital," by Karl Marx, which appeared in the " Demo- 
kratische Wochenblatt," at Leipzig, in 1868, which paper 
was the precursor of the " Volksstaat " and the present 
Berlin " Vowarts." 

Karl Marx makes a highly commendatory reference to 
the economic understanding of my father in the preface 
of the second edition of the first volume of " Capital." 
He also visited my father in Siegburg. 

At this point I must remember another friend of my 
father's, who deeply influenced his mental development. 
This is Ludwig Feuerbach, with whom my father enter- 
tained a correspondence. When in 1871 the news of the 
poverty and death of this philosopher reached my father, 
I remember seeing him cry for the first time. 

His small tannery in Siegburg permitted him to study 
with little interruption, since he did not care to accumu- 
late material wealth, his Siegburg heirloom guaranteeing 
in a modest way the necessities of life for himself and 
family, so long as it was kept together. That he did not 
succeed in keeping this heirloom intact, was a cause of 
much subsequent trouble to my father. There were al- 
ways a great number of friends who needed assistance 
that injured him. In one case he went to Denmark in 
order to assist a comrade financially in his tanning busi- 
ness. But the attempt failed, with great loss to himself. 
At the same time, his leather store and tannery in Sieg- 
burg were less and less able to compete with the growing 
great capitalist industries and to yield profits. Finally 
his last customers were almost wholly lost when he was 
taken into custody for three months, pending his trial 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 15 

in Cologne, in 1878. This arrest was made under the 
influence of the momentary excitement which had seized 
the German authorities after the attempt of Hodel and 
Nobiling, in 1878, to kill the German emperor. The di- 
rect cause of his arrest was a speech on " The Future of 
the Social-Democracy " which he had delivered in Co- 
logne. This speech appeared in print in Cologne in 1878 
and many new editions of it are being used up to the 
present for propaganda. 

During his stay in Siegburg from 1869 to 1884, my 
father wrote a large number of articles on economic and 
philosophical questions for the " Volksstaat," Leipzig, 
1870-1876; " Vorwarts," Leipzic, 1877; " Sozialdemo- 
krat," Zurich, 1880-1888 ; " Neue Gesellschaft," Zurich ; 
" Neue Zeit," Stuttgart ; " New Yorker Volkszeitung," 
New York, and a number of pamphlets. I am familiar 
with the following : " The Religion of Social-Democ- 
racy " (five sermons, Leipzic), "Bourgeois Society," 
Leipzic ; " Thoughts on Political Economy," Leipzic ; 
" An Open Letter to Heinrich von Sybel," Leipzic ; " The 
Faith of the Faithless," Solingen. 

At the international congress at The Hague, in 1872, to 
which my father was a delegate, Karl Marx introduced 
him to the assembled delegates with the words : " Here 
is our philosopher." 

In spite of his reluctance, due to his lack of training 
and, perhaps, also to lack of talent for parliamentary func- 
tions, he was induced in 1881 to accept a nomination for 
the Reichstag in the county of Leipzic. However, he was 
beaten by a coalition of the parties of " law and order." 
In 1880, when his Siegburg business had been undermined 
and his means reduced by half by unfortunate relatives 
and friends, he suggested to me, his eldest son, after 
completing my studies at the Siegburg " gymnasium," to 



1 6 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

emigrate to the United States and to become the path- 
finder for the existence of our family. After luck had 
favored me in this respect, my father was enabled to 
devote himself in peace to his life's work, which unfor- 
tunately was cut short prematurely when he had just 
completed his " Positive Outcome of Philosophy." 

How seriously he took his task, may be inferred from 
statements made before his death and from the following 
letter to me, written October 16, 1880: 

" An essential part of myself, the existence of which 
you may have suspected intuitively, but which you cannot 
really know, because we have never spoken of it, since 
you were too young, shall now be revealed to you. It 
will enable us to understand one another still better. To 
come to the point : I have been haunted since the days 
of my youth by a logical problem, viz., that of the * last 
questions of all knowledge.' It presses on my brain 
like a stone. Whenever in the course of past years the 
cares of providing for the necessities of life were urgent, 
I might forget about it for a few years. But as soon 
as matters would go along more smoothly, it would al- 
ways return, ever stronger and clearer, until finally of 
recent years I have come to the conclusion that this is 
the work of my life. My peace of mind as well as my 
moral duty demand that I should devote myself to it 
and accomplish it. If I had been aware of this in St. 
Petersburg as I am now, we might still be there. This 
is the reason why I have been continuously striving to 
find an associate who would help me to carry the eco- 
nomic burden. Hence we have had that experience in 
Denmark and Solingen (he had made an unlucky venture 
in leather also in Solingen), and for the same reason I 
cannot carry on my little business here without help. 
My efforts are always directed toward the end of keeping 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 1 7 

my brain disengaged from business, so that I may occupy 
myself with my. problem. For the last years I have 
had a hard time of it, for this problem rises with me and 
goes to bed with me, and the material cares do not per- 
mit me to pay much attention to it. Let this be enough 
for the present. I cannot say much about the subject 
itself, until you have become more mature. J. H. von 
Kirchmann, the publisher of the ' Philosophische Biblio- 
thek/ names as the first requisite for the pursuit of 
philosophy a life rich in experience and events, a life 
that has seen much, tasted every happiness and every 
pain, and done and suffered right and wrong. 

" Now I want to impress you with the desirability of 
genuine culture. Above all, do not forget, while in 
America, that one should do business for the sake of 
life, not live for the sake of business. Never be harsh in 
your judgment of others, but make allowance for their 
environment. In order to be able to act courteously, you 
must think courteously. Virtue and faults are always 
combined. Even the rascal is a good fellow, and ' the 
just sins seven times per day/ Now enjoy life atjd work 
bravely." 

The private letters which my father used to write me 
regularly every week or two from the time of my emi- 
gration in May 1880 up to his third landing in America 
in June 1884, I have collected in one volume. They 
may interest a wider circle, not only on account of the 
deep insight which they afford of the soul-life and char- 
acter of my father, but also on account of the wisdom 
of life and invaluable guides for the development of 
young and inexperienced people contained in them. 

My father wrote two series of letters on logic during 
the period 1880-1883. But only that dealing with a 
critique of the theory of understanding was published 



l8 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

by Dietz in Stuttgart in 1895, together with the "Posi- 
tive Outcome of Philosophy." Of the series dealing 
with economics, only the first seven letters appeared in 
print, in the " Sozialdemokrat " (Zurich, 1883-84). In 
reference to these letters, he wrote me on November 7, 
1883: 

"... Sorge will be more interested in these last 
three letters of the economic series than in the first 
series which is philosophical. For my part, I think more 
of the logical than the economic element, since what I 
have to say on the art of thinking is, so to speak, my own 
work and discovery, while I received my understanding 
of economics ready made from Marx." 

In the beginning of the eighties, my father was fre- 
quently visited by a number of students of the university 
in Bonn, among them Dr. Bruno Wille, who published, 
in the April number, 1896, of " Der Sozialistische Aka- 
demiker " (Berlin) his impressions in these words: 

" When I inquired in pleasant Siegburg for the home 
of Dietzgen, I was shown a little house covered with 
vines and situated in the middle of a garden on the bank 
of a creek. Skins soaking in water and the smell of 
oak bark indicated the presence of a tannery. A pretty 
girl of tall stature showed me into the parlor and called 
her father. The cozy room bore evidences of the literary 
inclinations of its owner, being filled with books which 
were plainly more than mere articles of decoration. 
There was also a portrait of Beranger. 

" Dietzgen entered and saluted me cordially. He was 
a man of giant stature, whose strength and animation did 
not betray his 54 years, although his luxuriant beard was 
grey. The first glance at his noble features convinced 
me that here was a man of genius. His large fiery eyes 
recalled the well-known potraits of Goethe. His beauti- 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 19 

ful forehead bore the imprint of the placid serenity of 
the antique philosophers. His manliness was combined 
with a loving and tender mind. His cordial sociability 
and the endearing melodiousness of his speech announced 
the best type of the Rhinelander. His voice sounded 
metallic, with a little nasal twang. Dietzgen came direct 
from his work in the shop, and he was not in the least 
embarrassed by meeting his visitor in his shirt sleeves. 
Thus he was an ideal illustration of the title of his 
first work, ' The Nature of Human Brain Work, by a 
working man/ 

" Dietzgen made ready for a walk with me. He 
abandoned his tannery without any ado. He carried it on 
only so far as it was required to maintain his modest 
household. This philosopher did not feel inclined to be 
a slave of work for gain. I discovered by his very first 
sentences that he was perfectly at home in the regions of 
higher mental life. Not a trace of the dust of the shop 
was on his soul. No professor could rise from his desk 
more spiritualized than this tanner did from his manual 
labor. In a few minutes, we were deeply engaged in a 
discussion of philosophical books and problems. I was 
surprised at Dietzgen's expert knowledge and general 
education, which was calculated to put to shame those 
conceited intellectuals who look down with disdain on 
the man without a university training. This philosoph- 
ical working man had even occupied himself with antique 
literature, and with better success than is generally shown 
by a graduate of a college, in spite of the fact that he 
was not familiar with Greek and only a beginner in 
Latin. When on a later occasion I visited him with a 
student who excelled in history, Dietzgen proved himself 
qualified to discuss with the greatest understanding a 
rather obscure special question of history. Such evi- 



20 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

dences of knowledge and mental superiority were given 
with extreme naturalness and simplicity, in which there 
was not an atom of that boastfulness which I have not 
unfrequently observed in self-educated men. Dietzgen 
was far too objective and wise to pose. 

" While I was in Bonn, my pilgrimages to Siegburg 
were one of my favorite pastimes. As a rule I brought 
with me some books from the library of the university for 
Dietzgen. Sometimes I was accompanied by my student 
friends. And I learned to love the workingman phi- 
losopher more and more. The versatility, strength and 
freshness of his talents were as inspiring as the oak tree 
distinguished by the luxuriance of its trunk, branches and 
foliage. Dietzgen was not a one-sidedly abstract and 
sober nature. His finely and sharply chiseled mental life 
was imbued with a certain poetic quality. His eye spark- 
led when resting on the beauties of nature during our 
walks. He was fond of poetry, especially of lyrics, which 
are generally neglected by inartistic minds. Once he 
recited for me a translation of a poem by Burns which 
he had clad in well-rounded German verse. If I am not 
mistaken, he then told me that he had paraphrazed sev- 
eral poems by Burns and Beranger. His mind had re- 
mained young in spite of his years. With joyful humor, 
fraternizing and freely conversing without restraint, he 
would sit among us young and frivolous folk drinking 
beer or punch. But he always held aloof from the trivial 
and maintained a mental level which compelled the re- 
spect of even the most forward. Otherwise, as a citizen 
of Siegburg, he led a rather lonely, almost hermit-like, 
existence. The bourgeois were not to his liking. More- 
over, they had a certain distrust of Socialism, especially 
the officials. He had little intercourse with comrades of 
the party, though there were quite a number of them in 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 21 

nearby Cologne. He seemed to feel no attraction for party 
life. He told me that he had given a few lectures in party 
meetings, and, if I am not mistaken, that he had been 
nominated for the Reichstag, but declared that he was 
no speaker and no politician. In his pleasant way, he 
related his experience with the authorities. Shortly after 
Hodel's attack on the emperor, he accepted an invitation 
of comrades of the party and gave a lecture on ' The 
Future of the Social-Democracy ' in Cologne. His man- 
uscript was published in pamphlet form under the same 
title. In his own words : ' In the meantime the second 
attack, that of Nobiling, had occurred, whereupon the 
uniformed, decorated, titled and official world of Ger- 
many leaped up as if bitten by a tarantula. They con- 
fiscated my pamphlet, handcuffed me to another vagabond, 
and delivered both of us on the eve of Pentecost to the 
prison of Cologne. After keeping me there for two 
months, they dragged me, together with the editor of the 
" Neue Freie Presse " and my Friend Kroger, who had 
committed the dangerous crime of acting as agent for 
my pamphlet — I don't know what — incited class against 
class, desecrated religion, endangered the public peace, 
etc., etc. After the court had dismissed us without any 
penalty and costs, I was again handcuffed by the 
gensd'armes and led to my cell. The public prosecutor 
had appealed the case. And when the second trial once 
more ended in my acquittal, the obstinate prosecutor 
appealed again, this time to the court of cassation in 
Berlin, where the author and his pamphlet were at last 
set free. A few days after that the anti-socialist laws 
put a radical end to all freedom, and the authorities 
gave me the documentary assurance that the future of the 
Social-Democracy was forbidden. Did not Xerxes whip 
the sea when it was rough? Now let the Prussians go 



22 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

ahead with their whipping. The Social-Democracy will 
attend to its own future.' " 

For the third time, my father emigrated to the United 
States in June, 1884. Soon after his arrival he accepted 
the editorship of the newly founded party organ in 
New York, " Der Sozialist," which he retained until he 
moved to Chicago, in 1886, at my solicitation, with my 
two sisters and one brother. One of his daughters, who 
had married in Russia was the only one of the family 
remaining in Europe. 

In Chicago, my father wrote in 1886 a work of 60 
pages, entitled " Excursions of a Socialist into the Do- 
main of Epistemology," which was published in 1887 by 
the People's Book Store in Hottingen-Zurich. In 1887, 
he wrote " The Positive Outcome of Philosophy." 

When in 1886 the editors of the " Chicagoer Arbeiter- 
zeitung " were arrested, to be condemned to death a year 
later in the well-known anarchist trial, my father tempo- 
rarily assumed the post of chief editor and remained a 
contributor to this paper up to the time of his death. 

At this point, I should like to insert a few statements 
about my father which F. A. Sorge, the intimate friend 
of Marx and Engels, and the Nestor of the American 
socialist movement, published in the Pioneer Calendar of 
the " New-Yorker Volkszeitung," in 1902 : 

" When he came to America for the third time, he 
rented, in a remote part of North New-Jersey, an old, 
almost dilapidated, house which was barely habitable, 
and there he felt quite satisfied, although visitors trod 
with misgivings on the steps of the rickety stairs which 
led to his rooms. In 1884, he wrote to a friend in regard 
to " the Marxian statement . . . that economics is 
the basis (also for the individual) on which the mental 
superstructures are reared. Our world desires to live, to 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN '23 

eat and drink in a civilized style, even though it be bar- 
barian inside. But for my part, I can be at ease in bar- 
barian surroundings, provided my private economy is 
arranged so that I can devote myself without care to the 
superstructure." 

Speaking of a proposed trip to Germany, he says in a 
letter of November 2J, 1887 : " I shall travel in the 
steerage, because a man who does not make any money 
has to turn his pennies over three times, before he spends 
them. Besides, I feel more at home in a humble role 
than on the high horse." 

His simplicity of living made him by no means morose 
or indifferent to the things of the outer world. That he 
enjoyed life and work is clearly shown by the following 
letter to a friend of his youth, who lived in New York: 

Siegburg, September 25, 1869. 

... I have returned from Petersburg to the scenes of my 
childhood, on the banks of the Sieg, have built huts in Siegburg, 
and am tanning the skins of the people. It occurs to me to 
express the wish that you might likewise be so strongly 
attracted by the home recollections that you leave the Hudson 
and the American chase after the dollar and come home with 
your better half and the material products of your loins, in 
order to dig for treasures which neither the rust nor the moths 
corrupt, that is, the general truths of science and of the historical 
evolution of the human race. Although man, according to 
Karl Vogt, is descended from monkeys, he is nevertheless the 
sublime object. 

At Otto Meissner's, the well-known embryo of my youth, 
the child which I have long carried under my heart, has at last 
been born. It has been baptized with the name of "The 
Nature of Human Brain Work, Discussed by a Working Man. 
A Renewed Critique of Pure and Practical Reason," and the 
preface is signed "Joseph Dietzgen, Tanner." I commend it 
to you. 

Another event which moves my heart and which will interest 



24 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

you is a visit which was paid to me about fourteen days ago 
by our venerated hero, Karl Marx. He stayed a few days in 
Sieburg with his charming daughter. Joseph Dietzgen. 



Personally, Joseph Dietzgen was a tall and handsome 
man, who strikingly resembled the oft-described figure of 
Goethe, symmetrically built and of noble and unaffected 
bearing, with a frank and open eye full of intelligence 
and goodness. His whole being inspired respect and 
veneration. He went almost too far in his modesty and 
unselfishness, especially in his relations with the pub- 
lishers of the " Sozialist " in New York, the National 
Executive of the Socialist Labor Party, who made life 
very unpleasant for him while he acted as editor of their 
paper. But with all his modesty and unassuming bear- 
ing, he still showed manliness and true courage. While 
the National Committer, after the throwing of the bomb 
at the Haymarket in Chicago, thought only of repudiating 
all connection with the anarchists, and with anarchism, 
Dietzgen, in the very midst of lawlessness of the heroes 
of " law and order," went to the persecuted and reviled 
and offered them his help and comfort in the hour of 
their need. It required real courage and strength of 
character to do so at that time. It was a purely humane 
and manly act on his part, for which the Chicago police 
rewarded him by searching his house and scaring his 
children. 

One of the contributors to the " Chicagoer Arbeiter- 
zeitung " of that period described Joseph Dietzgen's 
actions and bearing in those times as follows : " When 
in May, 1886, the waves of the labor movement began 
to rise, when the Haymarket bomb had exploded and 
the reaction followed with a police rule similar to that 
of Russia, when cautious and soberminded men c<?n.«iderc/ 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 2$ 

it well to deny any connection with the arrest of editors 
of the " Arbeiterzeitung, ,, an old gentleman intro- 
duced himself, on May 6, to those of the publishers who 
had not preferred to take to the woods. He offered them 
his services, because he considered it his duty to jump 
into the breach and fill the place of those comrades who 
had been torn out of the ranks of the fighters, and because 
he considered it necessary that the Chicago workers 
should not be without an organ in those trying times. 

This old gentleman, of giant stature, with the bearing 
of a patriarch, such as we see in good old pictures, was 
Joseph Dietzgen, who had shortly before joined his chil- 
dren in the young metropolis, in order to pass the re- 
mainder of his days in the circle of his adoring family. 
It was the same Dietzgen who had often been reviled and 
ridiculed in this Chicago paper by Spies and his com- 
panions, in a spiteful controversy, which, starting from 
a principle, had been directed by them against the un- 
known personality and sometimes old-fashioned and orna- 
mental style of Dietzgen. 

That this offer of Dietzgen's, who asked no pay for his 
services, and did not expect any, was brave and unselfish, 
was not only admitted by those to whom he had made it, 
but was also admired and appreciated by all who learned 
of it then and later. His offer was accepted, and when 
two weeks later the administrative board of the Socialist 
Publishing Society convened, they elected Dietzgen 
unanimously to the position of chief editor of the three 
papers published by this society, " Arbeiterzeitung," 
" Fackel," and " Vorbote." 

When the new editor in chief assumed control, he made 
the following little address to the employees which is 
typical of the whole man : " Gentlemen : I have been 
elected chief editor of your papers. If this position re- 



26 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

quires the duties of an overseer or driver, then I am 
not fit for it. I shall confine myself to the writing of my 
articles. It is said that there is no harmony in this 
office. Well, if you can have confidence in me, I shall 
be pleased to have you present your differences of opinion 
to me. I shall then try to act as arbitrator and to establish 
peace." 

Well, the dissension was not so very great, but the 
editorial staff learned to have confidence in their chief 
and to venerate him like a father. This relationship re- 
mained undisturbed, although Dietzgen did not stay in his 
position very long, but resigned his title and was satisfied 
to contribute articles up to the time of his death in April, 
1888. Being almost too modest and avoiding publicity 
with excessive bashfulness, he became very little known 
personally in Chicago. But all who were fortunate 
enough to become acquainted with him, loved the man and 
respected his character." 

And Sorge continues : " Dietzgen was assailed by 
friend and foe for his stand in defending the prisoners 
and taking editorial charge of the * Chicagoer Arbelter- 
zeitung/ during the prosecution of Spies and his com- 
rades. He tried to lessen the differences between social- 
ists and anarchists 1 by emphazing that which was 
common to both, in accordance with the requirements of a 
cultivated use of the intellect which teaches that ' there 
are only differences of degree, not radical differences, not 
absolute differences between things. Contradictions are 



1 Wherever we mention anarchists, it should be remembered that w» 
refer to the Chicago anarchists, so-called " communist anarchists," wb* 
were no individualists, but sincere, though very radical and theoretical 
unclear proletarian revolutionaries. It was these men whom my f»th» 
tried to win back for the socialist labor movement, not individua?* 
anarchists, as was thought by comrades in New York and Europe. 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 2*J 

solved by reasonable distinctions,' he says in his ' Positive 
Outcome of Philosophy/ " 

To a friend in the East of the United States he wrote 
on April 20, 1886: " For my part, I lay little stress on 
the distinction, whether a man is an anarchist or a 
socialist, because it seems to me that too much weight is 
attributed to this difference. While the anarchists may 
have mad and brainless individualists in their ranks, the 
socialists have an abundance of cowards. For this reason 
I care as much for the one as the other. The majority in 
both camps are still in great need of education, and this 
will bring about a reconciliation in good time." 

On May 17, 1886, he wrote : " I was of the opinion 
that the difference between socialists and anarchists should 
not be exaggerated, and when the bomb exploded and 
the staff of the ' Arbeiterzeitung ' was imprisoned, I at 
once offered my services, which were accepted." He 
wished to be only collaborator, not editor, and said 
further : " Anarchism would not have disturbed me so 
very much, only Mostism, which makes a system of 
violent assaults and private vengeance, could never have 
been congenial to me. I do not believe that this or that 
row hurts the party as much as the oversensitive are try- 
ing to make out. On the contrary, a nation should also 
be taught to assert itself/' 

When Dietzgen went to Chicago, he had been asked 
by the National Executive Committee of the Socialist 
Labor Party to write articles on the situation in Chicago. 
But when he sent his report on the Haymarket riot, it 
was rejected, because " it was diametrically opposed to 
the views of the Committee." Dietzgen then made sharp 
attacks on the " Sozialist " and the National Executive 
Committee by various articles in the " Chicagoer Arbeiter- 
z&tvnff,'' and he wrote to a friend about this on June 9, 



28 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

1886 : . . . " I call myself an anarchist in this 
quotation, and the passage left out explains what I mean 
by anarchism. I define it in a more congenial sense than 
is usually done. According to me, — and I am at one in 
this with all the better and best comrades, — we shall not 
arrive at the new society without serious troubles. I even 
think that we shall not get along without wild disturb- 
ances, without ' anarchy.' I believe that ' anarchy ' 
will be the stage of transition. Dyed-in-the-wool anarch- 
ists pretend that anarchism is the final stage of society. 
To that extent they are rattle brains who think they are 
the most radical people. But we are the real radicals who 
work for the communist order above and beyond anarch- 
ism. The final aim is socialist order, not anarchist dis- 
order. If the Chicago comrades would now avail them- 
selves of the state of affairs in their city, I could help 
them considerably. The anarchists would then join our 
ranks and would form,, together with the best socialists 
of all countries, a united and active troop, before which 
such weaklings as Stiebeling, Fabian, Vogt, Viereck, and 
others would be dispersed and forced to crawl under 
cover. For this reason, I think, the terms anarchist, 
socialist, communist, should be mixed together so that no 
muddle head could tell which is which. Language serves 
not only the purpose of distinguishing things, but also 
of uniting them, for it is dialectic. The words, and the 
intellect which gives meaning to language, cannot do 
anything else but give us a picture of things. Hence 
man may use them freely, so long as he accomplishes 
his purpose." . 

The dispute was carried along for some time, and when 
finally his friend in the East rebuked him also, Dietzgen 
wrote on April 9, 1888, a few days before his death : " I 
am still well satisfied with my approach to the anarchists 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 20, 

and am convinced that I have accomplished some good 
by it." 

Dietzgen was full of humor, always inclined to tease 
his friends and members of his family, and was in no 
way a Philistine. When some acquaintance reminded 
him of a promise, he replied : " Never take my word for 
anything, but consider it to be like mercury." 

And to a female friend of the family, he wrote : " If 
the children or one of them should complain about my 
making more promises than I keep, I wish you would 
not think evil of me. It is the fault of the credulous 
thildren whom I have taught from their youth that they 
must not believe everything I promise, but they are in- 
curable in this respect." 

Another time he announces that he still has an income 
of two marks per day in Germany and continues : " I 
shall try next summer, and anticipate great pleasure from 
so doing, to live on this sum in some German village like 
some cavalier in reduced circumstances." 

In a letter of July 18, 1887, he sounds a ribald note: 
" I have read Duntzer's ' Life of Goethe ' of late. This 
noble poet was a great Don Juan! How well he could 
love and jilt! His many loves have inspired me with a 
strong desire to imitate him, only I fear that I should 
have more trouble in being faithless. On the whole, the 
man is an admirable character." 

In November, 1887, he announces that he has received 
money for some literary work and adds : " Now I am a 
rich man, and as soon as my engagement with the paper 
here has expired, I shall return to Germany and try the 
pleasure of a hermit life in my native village. That is 
my ideal. Then, if I could find some old sweetheart of 
my youth in that place, I challenge my century." 

On February 2, 1888, he wrote : " . . . There is 



30 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

still another thing which occupies me a great deal and 
which I can mention to you only quite confidentially. 
. I am engaged in deepening an old friendship of 
my youth into love. If I knew that you were in a better 
mood to listen, I should tell you a little more about the 
foolishness of the aged ; but now I shall wait for a better 
time ..." 

While Dietzgen accomplished remarkable work in 
philosophy, and especially in dialectics, he was not less 
at home in political economy, in the study of the industrial 
development of society. With his sharp foresight, he 
soon recognized the trend of modern modes of capitalist 
production and their reaction on the political conditions 
of the various countries. 

As early as 1881, he wrote from Germany: "The 
United States will in my opinion remain the land of the 
future in bourgeois society. By means of the competition 
of the New World, the oppressive atmosphere of Europe 
will be cleared. Agriculture is visibly on the decline in 
Germany. The land is becoming more and more an ap- 
pendage of the cities and is turned into hunting grounds, 
parks, and country homes. And if our nation does not 
rally soon and overthrow its exploiters, the whole of 
Europe will soon become a sporting place of Americans. 
Our working men emigrate to America, and the fatted 
bourgeois immigrate from over there. Then they will 
have their factories in America, and their residences in 
Europe." 

And a few years later, in the first letter on logic written 
to his son, he declares that democratic and proletarian in- 
terests are identical and continues : " If this is not yet 
well recognized in the United States, it is due more to the 
fortunate natural resources of that country than to the 
scientific insight of its democracy. The spreading 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 3 1 

primeval forests and prairies offered innumerable home- 
steads to the poor and glossed the antagonism between 
capitalists and laborers, between capitalist and proletarian 
democracy. But you still lack the knowledge of prole- 
tarian economics which would enable you to recognize 
without a doubt that precisely on the republican ground 
of America, capitalism is making giant strides and re- 
vealing ever more clearly its twofold task of first enslav- 
ing the people for the purpose of freeing them in due 
time." 

This is not the place to dwell on the main works of 
Dietzgen, " The Nature of Human Brain Work " and 
" The Positive Outcome of Philosophy." But it may be 
said that Monism, the science of the unity of all being, did 
not find a more eloquent, convinced and convincing 
champion than Joseph Dietzgen in the second half of the 
XlXth century. He handled his dialectics, the midwife of 
his philosophical productions, in a wonderfully refreshing 
and original manner. In that very interesting work 
" Feuerbach, The Roots of the Socialist Philosophy," 
Frederick Engels explains the nature of dialectics and 
says : " And this materialistic dialectics, which for 
years has been our best tool and our sharpest weapon, 
was discovered, not by us alone, but by a German work- 
man, Joseph Dietzgen, in a remarkable manner and utterly 

independent of us and even of Hegel." Here I 

leave the data furnished by Sorge. 

Those who had become acquainted with my father's 
impressive and high-spirited style, were surprised at his 
mildness and modest reserve, when they made his per- 
sonal acquaintance. But behind these qualities, there 
stood the just pride of his true convictions. We children 
had the utmost liberty in our intercourse with him, but 
when we tried to abuse this freedom or to be too smart, 



32 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

then he quickly shamed us by a few words or by a mean- 
ing glance. A happier man than my father would have 
been hard to find, and none who was more loyal in all 
his relations. 

Death was to him, as to Feuerbach, not an evil. But he 
dreaded long suffering and admitted that he was afraid of 
it, while he bore short attacks of illness with resignation 
and even with good humor. Death finally proved a friend 
to him, for it left him only a few seconds of time to feel 
the shortness of breath and consternation which I read in 
his face when he fell into my arms, breathing his last. 
Paralysis of the heart killed him within two minutes. It 
was on a pleasant Sunday, April 15, 1888. In the morn- 
ing, after a walk in springclad Lincoln Park, we had 
emptied a bottle of wine between the two of us and had 
come home to dinner in the best of spirits. My father 
enjoyed his meal with his customary hearty appetite. 
When coffee was served immediately after dinner, one of 
my acquaintances happened to drop in. This was the 
cause of my father's lighting a cigar (instead of taking 
a half hour's nap as usual) and taking part in our con- 
versation on the social question. My acquaintance had 
not even a superficial knowledge of the subject, which did 
not prevent him, however, from making offhand state- 
ments. In spite of my remonstrance against such 
ignorance, my father became more vivacious and excited 
than I had ever seen him. With a seriousness and 
emphasis which I shall never forget, he related that he 
had foreseen the modern labor-movement forty years 
before this date, and proceeded to explain his views on the 
imminent collapse of capitalist production, when suddenly 
he stopped in the middle of a sentence, with his hand 
uplifted, and died in the manner described above. He 
was not quite sixty years old. 



LIFE OF JOSEPH DIETZGEN 33 

Simply and without any show, in harmony with the 
character of my father, we buried him by the side of the 
murdered anarchists in Forest Home Cemetery near Chi- 
cago, on April 17, 1888. 

(Translated by Ernest Untermann.) 



AN ILLUSTRATION OF THE PROLETARIAN 
METHOD OF RESEARCH AND CON- 
CEPTION OF THE WORLD. 

MAX STIRNER AND JOSEPH DIETZGEN. 
BY EUGENE DIETZGEN. 

Locarno, March, 1905. 

Stirner's work " The Individual and His Property " 
(Der Einzige und sein Eigentum), by its fundamental 
conception and frank advocacy of the principle of self- 
centered individualism, reminds one of Macchiavelli's 
work, " The Book of Princes." Stirner is the most con- 
sistent modern champion of the individualist-anarchist, 
or bourgeois, manner of thought, which is represented in 
literature by such stars as Schopenhauer, Hartmann, 
Nietzsche, Hauptmann, Ibsen, Lombroso, D'Annunzio, 
Tolstoi, Maeterlinck, or men like Chamberlain and Brooks 
Adams. For this reason, we shall employ " The Indi- 
vidual and his Property " for the purpose of illustrating 
the proletarian monist method of research and world-con- 
ception, elaborated for the first time on the basis of a 
theory of understanding by Joseph Dietzgen, by com- 
paring this theory with the dualist bourgeois conception 
of the mind and of the world. 

Stirner is unique, stimulating, and brilliant in his 
negative criticism of the supernatural belief in the cre- 
ative power of the absolute, or " pure," spirit. But he 
fails completely, and becomes himself sterile and be- 

35 



36 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

witched, as soon as a positive criticism of his subject is 
demanded. On this field, he has long been outdone by 
the historical materialism of Marx and Engels and the 
theory of understanding of Dietzgen. 

Stirner declared war against all spooks and their sup- 
porters, because Christianity, liberalism, and Utopian com- 
munism, instead of seeing through the hallucinations of 
the socalled pure spirit and its catchwords of god, liberty, 
morality, law, state, society, authority, etc., welcomed it 
and its creatures as allies for the degradation and enslave- 
ment of the individual. However, while Stirner flattered 
himself with having discovered an impregnable method of 
combat, he did not follow the example of Marx and 
Engels, who confronted the aprioristic hallucinations with 
the sober demonstration of the historical fact, that they 
were but necessary phenomena and companions of ten- 
dencies, which are conditioned on particular processes of 
social life and cannot, therefore, disappear until these do. 
Nor did it occur to him to forge a mighty weapon against 
obsolete conceptions after the manner of Dietzgen, who, 
inspired by historical materialism, deepened and elabo- 
rated it into a conception of the world by means of his 
analysis of the force of thought and understanding which 
revealed the dependence of the human mind on social 
conditions as well as its interrelation with nature and the 
universe. We shall show in the following lines, that 
Dietzgen's theory of understanding was the first to thus 
completely demonstrate the fantastic nature of all purely 
deductive abstractions and of the " pure " spirit. Stirner 
does not do anything of the kind, but contents himself 
with pointing out the injuriousness of pure catchwords 
for the trusting individual, without suspecting the social 
and cosmic origin and basis of those catchwords. Conse- 
quently he necessarily remains in the same circle of mental 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 37 

hallucinations as his bourgeois opponents. And accord- 
ingly he recommends as a panacea — the same as all 
anarchists after him — that the consciously egoistic self, 
that is to say the individual with his psycho-physical 
power, who considers himself above society, be seated 
upon the world-throne as an individual and independent 
power, enjoying in his capacity of autocrat and hyper- 
man only individual rights, without regard to society and 
nature and without any duties. 

Stirner's ideas are not completely intelligible, unless 
one takes into consideration the most advanced intellectual 
tendencies preceding the March revolution, under whose 
influence he wrote his work. In this category belong 
especially the speculative communism of Babeuf, Proud- 
hon, and Weitling, the first attempts of critical com- 
munism made by Marx and Engels in the " Deutsch- 
Franzoesischen Jahrbuecher " (German-French Annals), 
in March, 1844, which Stirner understood merely in an 
ideological way, furthermore Hegel's dialectic, and finally 
Feuerbach's realistic humanitarianism (The Essence of 
Christianity) and Bauer's idealistic humanitarianism (in 
the " Allgemeine Literaturzeitung "). 

In this storm and stress period, Stirner deserves men- 
tion as one of the most brilliant minds of liberal intel- 
lectualism, excelling by his quaint natural wit and his 
artistic imagination. 

In his vain struggle with the ideological method of 
speculation and its spook of a pure spirit, he has many 
a flash of bright thought, which strikes one like that of 
some modern thinker, making a passionate appeal to one's 
selfreliance and independent thought, selfdependence and 
selfemancipation, as opposed to the servile degradation 
of one's personality by religious, philosophical, liberal, and 
social spooks. It is this spirited appeal to self respect, 



38 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

which constitutes the important merit of Stirner's work, 
for by means of it he creates at least strong doubts as 
to the authority of any and all spooks, which are the 
creations of the aprioristic conceptions of the clerically 
divine, liberally moral, and socially humanitarian ideolo- 
gies. 

Stirner also takes occasion to say words full of warmth 
and strength about the proletariat, without, however, 
realizing the definite historical role of this class and 
economic category of society. 

The entire work of Stirner is pervaded as much by his 
strong side, the negative ridicule of the catchwords of 
speculative idealism, as by his weak side, the fantastic and 
idealistic deification of pure egoism. 

The reader will look in vain for some positive point 
of vantage in this hymn of egoism. It has neither bot- 
tom nor boundaries. Stirner is not content to use egoism 
as an indispensable and sound weapon against the hypo- 
critical, sentimental, and servile selfdenial, which is being 
preached by the priesthood of all creeds. Instead, he has 
such an exaggerated and fantastic conception of egoism, 
that it loses all definite outlines and becomes quite as 
much of a spook as the clerical and liberal liberty, law, 
humanity, authority, etc. 

With equal lack of insight into the natural differentia- 
tion and at the same time natural unity of all things 
and phenomena Christianity worships the spirit of god, 
liberalism the spirit of the individual, Hegel the absolute 
ideal, Feuerbach human love. And so Stirner worships 
self-love. In his egoism, the immediate, more remote, 
and most remote personal interests all merge without dis- 
tinction into one, so that love, selfsacrifice, selfdenial, and 
even selfdestruction have an indiscriminate place in it. 

It is this peculiar antidiabetic conception of abstract 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 39 

ideas, which gives to Stirner such a confused notion of 
egoism, and of the importance and power of the individual 
separated from society, and by this means he places his 
followers, the anarchists of every shade and the supermen 
of the Nietzsche stamp, on strained terms with all sober 
logic. 

Experience teaches, that a man becomes possessed as 
soon as he falls so completely into thraldom to catchwords, 
that he only believes in them and makes no conscious 
effort to analyze them and bring them into accord with 
the array of facts which can be tested empirically. With 
naive faith, superstition and fantasy simultaneously begin 
their confusing play. Then the intellectuals among the 
liberal and confessional preachers know how to inaugurate 
their partly brilliant, partly artistic, scintillation of words, 
which enables the shrewdest of them to hoodwink the 
gullible. It is a perplexing music which the leading 
preachers make for their faithful lambs in order to fish 
in troubled waters, either consciously or unconsciously. 
Among others, apart from Stirner, it is by the way, 
especially Nietzsche, who is such an unconscious fisher- 
man, and who even excels his master in his confusion of 
abstract ideas. In spite of the perfect form of such works 
as " Thus Spake Zarathustra," it will be hard to find any 
reader, who would be able to cull from this tinkling of 
words a single clear and new thought, which would stand 
the test of scientific analysis. 

Because morality, order, law, the state, etc., have so 
long been employed as bogies, therefore Stirner opines 
that this whole plunder should be thrown away. 

He derives the right of sterile negation from his 
extravagant lack of discernment. But for this very 
reason, Stirner cannot detach himself from faith and 
arrive at science. For him, in true bourgeois fashion, 



40 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

the dependent nature of the individual on the universe 
and society has remained as much of a riddle as the 
equally dependent nature cf those abstract ideas. And 
thus he struggles helplessly in his own snares. Because 
the individual is abused by those catchwords, which 
neither the liberals nor himself could digest, therefore 
they have no right to existence at all in the opinion of 
Stirner and are supposed to fall at the mere command of 
his self, his individuality. And such a harebrained men- 
tality is taken seriously by the anarchists, by Nietzsche, 
and his disciples ! 

The work of Stirner naturally ends in making a saint 
of the pure ego. This is the insane idea of the " Indi- 
vidual " and his unenviable " Property," as we shall now 
try to demonstrate more clearly. 

We certainly agree with Stirner in opposing the priestly 
and illadvised use of catchwords, but we do not spill the 
child with the bathing water. If Stirner had not him- 
self remained entrapped in priestly conceptions, he would 
have made short work of the absolute sacredness of those 
great catchwords, by analyzing them and demonstrating 
that they were relatively sacred, that is to say wholesome, 
according to time and place. 

It is no wonder, that the fundamentally Utopian state- 
ments of Babeuf, Proudhon, and Weitling did not lead the 
most typical apostle of anarchism into a new road. The 
same is also true of the romantic articles of Bruno Bauer. 
But at least Hegel's dialectics and Feuerbach's theses 
should have stimulated Stirner to more fertile thoughts 
than a mere negative critique, granted that such a critique 
on his part was in some respects justified, if he had only 
possessed a little more aptitude for historical interde- 
pendence and the theory of understanding. 

For want of study of the laws of thought and society, 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 41 

Stirner's struggles for a positive conception of the world 
did not yield any clear result concerning the relation of the 
individual toward society and nature. This is the final 
reason that prevents him from culling the sound kernel 
from the catchwords which he criticizes. It is therefore 
but a consistent act of helpless desperation and a bowing 
to the undefeated spooks, that he always hides behind 
the armor of a knight of pure egoism. 

He sees, indeed, the interaction of mind and body and 
that of these two in society and nature, so that their 
mutual interdependence is revealed. But he does not 
arrive at a clear understanding of the degree and im- 
portance of the dependent role of the individual factors in 
this interrelation, because the actual mutuality and oppo- 
sition of phenomena obscures for him their equally 
real social and cosmic unity. But it is this total interre- 
lation of all phenomena, which compels man to distinguish 
the individual relations, according to their importance, by 
genera, species, classes, families, etc., in order to orient 
himself in the universe. Stirner lacks appreciation for 
the dialectics and interrelation of things and thoughts. 
Hence the understanding does not come to him, that the 
human individual, being a product of nature in body and 
soul, is so inseparably and universally connected with 
nature, that his growing individuality and power is con- 
ditioned on the increasing understanding and utilization 
of this natural, and socially ever-increasing, dependence. 
He ignores furthermore the fact, that such an under- 
standing and utilization is not due to the individual 
personality as such, but to its capacity as a member of 
society and nature, because the individual can exist only 
in this capacity, and develop, gain power and exercise it 
by this means. And finally he remains ignorant of the 
fact, that a society and its egos are mainly determined, so 



42 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

far as the historical peculiarity of their existence is con- 
cerned, by the particular degree of development of the 
social forces of production of their time. This under- 
standing came to Engels by a study of the English, to 
Marx by that of the French revolution, and it came to 
both of them at the time of Stirner. While Feuerbach 
had demonstrated, that men and human existence were not 
created by god (spirit, consciousness), but that man had 
created god after his own image, Marx, having studied 
also social science, taught furthermore : " It is not the 
consciousness of men that determines their existence, but 
their social existence which determines their conscious- 
ness." 

Mehring has shown in volume II of the " Posthumous 
Writings of Marx, Engels, and Lassalle," that Marx had 
found the enlightening sentences almost literally in the 
works of the oldest French socialists : " If man is formed 
by external circumstances, then circumstances must be 
modeled to suit man. If man is by nature social, then 
he can develop his true nature only in society, and the 
power of his nature must not be judged by the power of 
the single individual, but by that of his social surround- 
ings." In the further development of this thought, Marx 
wrote in the " German-French Annals " : " Not until 
the real, individual man discards the abstract citizen of 
the state and realizes that he, as an individual, in his 
actual life, his individual work, his individual relations, 
is a generic being, not until man has organized his indi- 
vidual powers into social powers and ceased to separate his 
social powers from his political powers, will human eman- 
cipation be accomplished." (See Mehring, " Posthumous 
Writings, etc.," volume I, page 352, German edition.) 

The Marxian term " generic being," which is plainly 
defined at this place as an individual conscious of his social 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 43 

power, is ridiculed by Stirner as an empty abstraction, be- 
cause he did not know what to do with it from mere 
ideological narrowmindedness. Stirner also passed with- 
out understanding by the other attempts at critical com- 
munism, which Engels published in the same periodical 
in his " Outlines For A Critique Of Political Economy." 

"I have built my affairs on nothing (but myself)." 
With this pert statement, Stirner begins and concludes his 
book. 

It is not nature, the creator of the human individual, 
nor society, the supporter of his life, which are the 
determining powers, according to Stirner, but the single 
individual, who acknowledges them only so far as they 
serve him. But if they refuse to do him this favor, the 
individual places himself above nature and society and be- 
comes — a superman. " Why do you hesitate to take 
courage and constitute yourselves into the center and main 
factor of things ? Why do you pine for liberty as you do 
for your dreams? Are you your own dream? Do not 
stop to inquire of your dreams, your imaginations, your 
thoughts, for all that is but a * hollow theory/ Inquire 
of yourselves and care for yourselves — that is practical, 
and you love to be ' practical ' — Therefore turn rather 
to yourselves and be your own gods or idols. Bring 
forth that which is in you, show it in the light, reveal your 
own selves." Thus speaks Stirner. 

And how does he propose to realize this ? Very simple ! 
" I secure for myself liberty against the world to the 
extent that I make the world my own, that I conquer and 
take possession of it, be this done by any force whatever, 
by persuasion, request, a categorical demand, or even 
hypocrisy, fraud, etc. ; for the means which I use for this 
purpose depend on what I am." And again, " My free- 
dom does not become perfect, until it is my power; and 



44 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

by this means I cease being merely a free man and I 
become a selfpossessed free man. Why is the freedom 
of nations an i empty word ' ? Because the nations have 
no power. With one breath of the living ego I blow down 
whole nations, whether it be the breath of a Nero, a 
Chinese emperor, or a poor writer." 

These words remind one of " Uncle Braesig," who 
thought he had explained poverty, when he called it 
" pauvrete." Without power no liberty ; but how do I get 
power ? All that Stirner has to say in reply is that power 
dwells in myself, in the individual, who becomes a self- 
possessed free man, when he brings forth power out of 
himself. The " free " will of the individual is supposed 
to suffice for this purpose ! Leaving aside the fact that 
Stirner himself has nothing but words to show in sub- 
stantiation of his claim! — for we learn from his biog- 
rapher that he ended in poverty and misery in spite of his 
mighty Ego — where are there in authenticated history 
any individuals endowed with such mighty wills and 
power by their own unaided personality? The super- 
humanly powerful role ascribed by historical fables to 
chiefs of savage hords, those " selfpossessed free men " by 
virtue of their physical strength and ability, has been re- 
duced to its modest and dependent measure, and no one 
has accomplished this more thoroughly than Lewis H. 
Morgan in his " Ancient Society." We need not, there- 
fore, pause for any further consideration of the exag- 
gerated power of such " strong men." The " self- 
possessed " power of the individuality is merely that 
spleen, of which Stirner cannot rid himself. This is his 
misfortune and that of all liberals, who have this in 
common with the anarchists and the autocrats, in short 
with the entire bourgeoisie, that they believe, in perfect 
harmony with their system of " free " competition, in the 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 45 

spook of the selfpossessed free individual. It is the 
merit of Marx, Engels, and Dietzgen, to have demon- 
strated, that the fundamental explanation for this dogma, 
which deserves a place by the side of the infallibility of the 
pope, is found in definite conditions of production and 
existence giving rise to the dualistic method of thought 
of a bourgeoisie operating with absolute contradictions. 

Marx and Engels have shown more clearly than their 
predecessors the role of the individual as a social power, 
while Dietzgen fortified and extended this proof, which 
is of such great consequence for the study of society and 
history, by showing in his theory of understanding that 
the human faculty of thought is no more and no less than 
an ordinary cosmic force and phenomenon, and that it is 
in its activity absolutely dependent upon the connection 
with other natural phenomena. In this way Dietzgen 
cleared the road for a scientific conception of the world. 
On the other hand, whether we believe with the wor- 
shippers of a god in a supernatural being, or with the 
liberals in a supernatural human spirit and will, we believe 
in the same dualism and agree in the last analysis with 
the anarchist confusion concerning the position of the per- 
sonality in society and nature. 

Religious dualism: God and nature; liberal dualism: 
intangible spirit and tangible matter ; anarchist dualism : 
individual and society — nature. 

The dualistic relationship between the believers in a 
god, free thinkers, and anarchists is palpable. For the 
believers in a god, the rule of the individual over man- 
kind is a divine dogma ; for the liberals, it is a spiritual 
dogma; and for the anarchists, it is a demand of the 
" free " personality. For all three of them, this dualism 
obstructs their grasp of the monistic interrelation of in- 



46 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

dividuals, society, and nature, thus preventing their radi- 
cal rupture with all spooks. 

Stirner ridicules the universal abstract liberty, but 
clings to an equally abstract power of the " self-pos- 
sessed " individual. However, he does not take the least 
trouble trying to expose this power and its anything but 
individual origin. 

In opposition to him, Engels, standing on the shoulders 
of Hegel, drew the veil from the verbose individuality 
and will-power of Stirner with the following words, to be 
found in his " Anti-Duhring " : " Hegel was the first to 
correctly represent the relation of freedom and necessity. 
For him, freedom consisted in the understanding of 
necessity. Necessity is " blind " only to the extent that 
it is not understood. Freedom is not found in the 
fancied independence from laws of nature, but in the un- 
derstanding of these laws and the resulting possibility to 
make them produce definite effects according to our plans. 
This applies equally to the laws of nature outside of so- 
ciety and to those which regulate the physical and in- 
tellectual well-being of man inside of it, for these two 
classes of laws, while they may be separated in thought, 
cannot be held apart in reality. Freedom of will means, 
therefore, simply the faculty of making decisions based 
on understanding. The more a man's judgment con- 
cerning a certain question is free, the greater will be 
the necessity by which the substance of this judgment 
is determined. On the other hand, ignorance engenders 
a vaccillation, which chooses between various opposing 
possibilities with apparent arbitrariness, but proves by 
this very fact its lack of freedom, its subjection to the 
very thing, which it ought to dominate. Freedom there- 
fore consists of our control over ourselves and nature 
based on an understanding of natural necessities. Hence 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 47 

it is as a matter of course a product of historical devel- 
opment." 

We observe, then, that Engels understands the art of 
combining freedom and necessity dialectically, by declar- 
ing that freedom results as a historical product from 
a study of necessity and its social and natural interre- 
lations, in such a way that any one may make the test 
himself and thus arrive at a scientific understanding. In 
the same way, Marx shows that the power of the indi- 
vidual is from natural necessity a social power, and that 
the past great struggles of mankind were fundamentally 
social and class struggles. We thereby secured prac- 
tical illustrations of the fertility of the critical and in- 
ductive method taking its departure consciously from 
facts and classifying them into laws, or rules. Both 
Marx and Engels were enabled by this method to secure 
quite as exact results on the field of historical, economic 
and political science, as natural science, strictly speaking, 
in its own field. On the other hand, the purely deduc- 
tive method, resting on the irreconciled antagonism of 
a supernatural mind and natural matter, which made it 
dualistic, has demonstrated its scientific impotence, be- 
cause it pretended to derive understanding in an a priori 
fashion, that is, independently of an analysis of the gen- 
eral laws of experienced facts, by means of " pure " 
spirit. So far as the past is concerned, we are obliged to 
recognize that the fantasies generated by the purely de- 
ductive method had a certain merit, because they were a 
necessary social product of their time, which made fur- 
ther progress possible. But in our day, these fanciful 
imaginations have become injurious and reactionary on 
account of changed social conditions, and even Stirner's 
example proves this. 

The substantiation of the critical and inductive method 



48 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

by means of the analysis and synthesis of understanding 
and nature, and the demonstration of its fertile and con- 
sistently monistic applicability to all social and cosmic 
phenomena, was the particular work of Joseph Dietzgen. 
It accompanied the rise of the proletariat, which assisted 
Marx and Engels in realizing the nature of social move- 
ments and interrelations. Their studies enabled Dietzgen 
to make another step forward by founding the monistic 
conception of the world on his theory of understanding. 

Seeing that the consistently dialectic and monistic, or 
critically inductive, method of thought with its cosmic 
crowning was a necessary concomitant of the rise of the 
proletariat as a social-economic class and had for its 
premise the existence of such a class, we are justified in 
calling it the proletarian method. This term is further- 
more fitting for the reason that all other social classes, 
owing to their economic interests, are necessarily advo- 
cates of the dualistic, or purely deductive method of 
thought, in all fields of abstraction, such as those of the 
state, society, morality, freedom, etc. If we comprise all 
ruling classes on account of the identity of their interests 
as opposed to those of the proletariat as one bourgeois 
class, then we find that this economic antagonism ex- 
presses itself also as an antagonism of the bourgeois and 
proletarian method of thought. On one side we have the 
bourgeois, dualistic, or purely deductive method, on the 
other the proletarian, dialectically monistic, or critically 
inductive method. This applies even to the most ad- 
vanced bourgeois natural scientists in every case, where 
they pass from their specialties to the fields of the so- 
called science of the intellect. 

How is it, now, that a proletarian arrives more easily 
at a consistently monistic method of thought, and at a 
clearer understanding of social and cosmic interrelations ? 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 49 

Is it, perhaps, because proletarians are individuals of 
deeper insight and better than men of other classes ? By 
no means. So far as personality is concerned, a prole- 
tarian is equipped no better than a bourgeois. That 
which distinguishes him to his advantage from a bour- 
geois is not due to him as an individual, but as a member 
of a definite economic class. Being a member of the 
wage-working class, of the proletariat, he is left by virtue 
of his economic condition with no other inalienable prop- 
erty but his intellectual and physical labor-power. This 
state of things carries with it the growing understanding 
of the fact that his might and power are not due to his 
own unaided individuality, but to his connection with 
the labor-power of his class. The proletarian is thus 
taught by his economic condition, that he must use his 
power as a social one. By this means he becomes class- 
conscious, conscious of the importance and power of his 
class in society. It is not difficult to understand, that the 
socialist aim of the socialization of the means of pro- 
duction must necessarily follow from this class-conscious- 
ness. The bourgeois, on the contrary, being an advo- 
cate of the private ownership of the means of production, 
favors the opposite individualistic representation of his 
interests. If a bourgeois unites with the members of his 
class, he does so merely under the pressure of competition 
or of the proletarian organization, but always with the 
reservation of Stirner to the effect that the " freedom " 
of his organization shall permit him at any moment to 
sell his shares and leave his club as soon as it inter- 
feres with his individualist principles. He is enabled, 
by virtue of the above-named property, to avail himself 
of the " freedom " of his association, of course at the 
expense of others. Not so the proletarian. His econo- 
mic condition necessarily prescribes to him a permanent 



50 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

association with equals, who shall use the means of 
production co-operatively for their common interest, in 
order to secure for each member the greatest possible 
happiness in the freest development of his or her physical 
and intellectual faculties. Owing to the fact, that no 
society, not even one without privileges, can exist without 
definite regulations, and that among equals two are more 
powerful than one, the majority determines the rules of 
common work and life for all. This is resented by the 
individualism of the liberals and anarchists, because they 
want to be more than equals, that is to say, supermen. 
Unfortunately for them, necessity enforces its decrees 
against all pious wishes. And this necessity consists of 
the fatal law compelling everybody's dependence on so- 
cially useful labor, without which even the greatest 
genius cannot live. The liberal-anarchist dream of the 
individual and his absolute property, free from the bonds 
of society, could not be realized, even if nature were to 
grant freely and lavishly the most excessive demands for 
food, clothing and shelter. For even in that case, we 
should still be bound to respect definite laws regulating 
the association of men in such a way that the development 
and care of all would be promoted, including minors and 
sick, children and aged. 

In order to be able to use the proletarian, consistently 
monistic, conception and its critically inductive method 
with assurance, we must first become aware of the per- 
versity of the liberal-anarchist, self-centered, dualist mode 
of thought, and overcome its allegedly aprioristic and de- 
ductive method. 

An isolated man in his natural state is helpless against 
the forces of nature, which include other men and wild 
animals. He must rely for protection and sustenance on 
the assistance of his fellowmen. Therefore he associates 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 51 

with them from necessity. But the overpowering forces 
of nature, such as fire, wind, water, disease, inspire him 
with fear, because he does not understand and know how 
to control them. He feels that they threaten his exis- 
tence. Therefore he tries to meet these mysterious 
forces by equally mysterious measures. The first result 
of the feeling of helpless dependence on nature was the 
rise of religious cults. These cults remained natural 
religions, so long as man had not learned to understand 
the natural character of elementary forces and to make 
them tributary to himself. Later on, the dual nature of 
individual power, which is at the same time individual 
and socially cosmic, tormented man with religious pains. 
Natural religion then became spiritual religion, trans- 
forming the idolization of nature and of the present world 
into an idolization of the spirit and the next world. His- 
tory teaches us in accord with the theory of understand- 
ing, that this transformation took place in the course of 
thousands of years as a corollary of the transition from 
communist property in means of production to private 
property. So long as men lived in primitive communities 
and applied their individual powers directly as social 
ones, natural religion prevailed. Exchange of products 
with neighboring communes, in other words, the removal 
of products outside of the producing commune, did not 
arise, until the individual communes had raised their pro- 
ductive power to the point where they could produce 
more than they needed for their own consumption. For 
a time, the commune remained the owner of the articles 
of exchange in the interest of its members. But no 
sooner did the products find a market outside of the 
commune, than the wedge of dissolution was driven into 
primitive communism. As a rule those individuals, who 
had the function of placating the idols, or who had some 



52 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

other prominent social position, succeeded by means of 
their authority in managing the exchange of products for 
their own benefit and transforming themselves from 
servants into masters of the commune, by securing con- 
trol of the means of production. The institution of such 
private ownership was naturally the end of commun- 
ism. The way was cleared for the development of the 
production of commodities, leading toward modern capi- 
talism. The assumption of superiority on the part of an 
individual over society, as a permanent feature, was 
made possible only by private ownership, which on its 
part owed its rise to a definite point of development of 
the productive forces of the commune. Thanks to 
private property, the power of the individual seemed to 
be due less to social labor and to the further interrelation 
with nature, than to his own individuality. The articles 
of exchange of such independent individuals necessarily 
assumed the character of commodities, owing to the lowly 
developed state of the productive forces. By this means, 
the plain social nature of individual labor in the commune 
assumed the mysterious character of products of indi- 
vidual labor, of commodities. Individualism triumphed 
over communism. The gods of nature of consciously 
social men gave way to the supernatural gods of indi- 
viduals misapprehending their own social and cosmic in- 
terrelations. Individual property led to the condensation 
of polytheism into monotheism. Finally the " pure " 
spirit of the individual became the god of " enlightened " 
capitalism. Just as the virgin Mary of the catholics 
gave birth to Christ without having become pregnant, so 
pure reason begets thought without being impregnated 
by the objects of sense perception. Thus results the un- 
conditional and aprioristic " science," which is still being 
taught quite generally by the modern universities. The 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 53 

characteristic mark of this science is that it takes its de- 
parture from the principle of pure spirit. Hence it re- 
mains theological and theosophical. We propose to con- 
front it later with proletarian science, which takes its 
departure consciously from verifiable and matter of fact 
premises. 

The indissoluble interrelation of the individual with 
society rests, according to us, on his helplessness, if left 
with no other resource for his maintenance and defense 
but his own labor-power. Man is, therefore, compelled 
to seek the assistance of other men. This dependence 
explains the inevitable social nature of individual labor- 
power. Marx calls the understanding of this nature of 
individual labor-power the essential point which is re- 
quired for an intelligent discussion of political economy. 
It is the great merit of Marx and Engels to have substan- 
tiated and propagated this knowledge. This is the basis 
of the analyses in Marx's " Capital ", this reveals the dual 
nature of private property, this furnishes the key for an 
understanding of the nature of commodities, value, 
money, capital, and of the entire social science. It also 
lays bare the kernel of such terms as morality, right, 
state, authority, etc. 

It was the misfortune of Stirner to regard these terms 
as arbitrary catchwords, while the Marxian Dietzgen 
knows how to show up the sober social nature of these 
spooks. With regard to morality, he says in his 
" Nature of Human Brain Work " : " Morality is the 
aggregate of the most contradictory ethical laws which 
serve the common purpose of regulating the conduct 
of man toward himself and others in such a way 
that the future is considered as well as the present, the 
one as well as the other, the individual as well as the 
genus. The individual man finds himself lacking, inade- 



54 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

quate, limited, in many ways. He requires for his com- 
plement other people, society, and must, therefore, live 
and let live. The mutual concessions which arise out of 
these relative needs are called morality." 

" The inadequacy of the single individual, the need 
of association, is the basis and cause of man's considera- 
tion for his neighbors, of morality. Now, since the one 
who feels this need, man, is necessarily an individual, it 
follows that his need must likewise be individual and 
more or less intensive. And since my neighbors are 
necessarily different from me, it requires different con- 
siderations to meet their needs. Concrete man needs a 
concrete morality. Just as abstract and meaningless as 
the concept of mankind in general is that of absolute 
morality, and the ethical laws derived from this vague 
idea are quite as unpractical and unsuccessful. Man is a 
living personality, whose welfare and purpose is embod- 
ied within himself, who has between himself and the 
world nothing but his needs as a mediator, who owes no 
allegiance to any law whatever from the moment that it 
contravenes his needs. The moral duty of an individual 
never exceeds his interests. The only thing which ex- 
ceeds those interests is the material power of the gener- 
ality over the individuality." 

" If we regard it as the function of reason to ascertain 
that which is morally right, a uniform scientific result 
may be produced, if we agree at the outset on the persons, 
conditions, or limits within which the universal moral 
right is to be determined; in other words, we may ac- 
complish something practical, if we drop the idea of abso- 
lute right and search for definite rights applicable to 
well-defined purposes by clearly marking the boundaries 
of our problem. The contradiction in the various 
standards of morality, and the many opposing solutions 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 55 

of this contradiction, are due to a misunderstanding of 
the problem. To look for right without a given quantity 
of sense perceptions, without some definite working ma- 
terial, is an act of speculative reason, which pretends to 
explore nature without the use of senses. The attempt 
to arrive at a positive determination of morality by pure 
perception and pure reason is a manifestation of the 
philosophical faith in understanding a priori/' 

And with regard to right, Dietzgen writes in the same 
work : " Reason cannot discover within itself any posi- 
tive rights or absolutely moral codes any more than any 
other speculative truth. It cannot estimate how essential 
or unessential a thing is, or classify the quantity of its 
concrete and general characters, until it has some per- 
ceptible material to work upon. The understanding of 
the right, or of the moral, like all understanding, strives 
to single out the general characteristics of its object. 
But the general is only possible within certain definite 
limits, it exists only as the general qualities of some con- 
crete and perceptible object. And if any one tries to rep- 
resent some maxim, some law, some right, in the light of 
an absolute maxim, law, or right, he forgets this necessary 
limitation. Absolute right is merely a meaningless con- 
cept, and it does not assume even a vague meaning, until 
it is understood to stand for the right of mankind in 
general. But morality, or the determination of that which 
is right, has a practical purpose. Yet, if we accept the 
general and unconditional right of mankind as a moral 
right, we necessarily miss our practical aim. An act, 
or a line of action, which is universally or everywhere 
right, requires no law for its enforcement, for it will 
recommend itself. It is only the determined and limited 
law, adapted to certain persons, classes, nations, times, 
or circumstances, which has any practical value, and it is 



56 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

so much more practical, the more defined, exact, precise 
and the less general it is." 

What signifies, furthermore, the state which Stirner 
denies offhand and which individuals are supposed to be 
able to blow over by sheer will-power ? It is well known 
to be nothing else but the executive committee of the 
ruling minority, who can impose their rule, thanks to the 
private ownership in means required for the production 
of the material necessities of life, so long as this rule and 
this private ownership are necessary for the development 
of the productive forces to a climax where the develop- 
ment of personality becomes possible for all. With the 
advent of this climax, and after the victorious struggle 
of the proletariat, driven forward by its material require- 
ments, minority rule, or the state, disappears and gives 
way to universal suffrage and rule. Where all rule, no- 
body serves, and vice versa, where all serve, nobody rules. 
We refer the reader, who would inform himself or herself 
further about this point, to Kautsky's " Erfurt Program " 
or to Marx's " Capital." These works will throw a 
bright light on some more catchwords of Stirner. 

The elaboration and demonstration of the following 
axioms : The human individual is a social laborer, and : 
Human labor is a social organism, which determines the 
nature of the interior world of the individual member, 
that is, his consciousness and mental activity in all lines 
of thought such as religion, ethics, law, politics, science 
and art, by producing changes in the economic nature of 
the society and the world surrounding him, — are the 
fundament of Marxism in a strict sense. They furnish 
the key for an understanding of critical communism as 
a science of society and a conception of history. 

Social labor produces the requirements for the exist- 
ence of individuals. The organization of the productive 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 57 

process is determined by the available forces of produc- 
tion, that is to say, by the means and methods of produc- 
tion. The degree of development of these determines 
the character of a society and its members. It explains 
the introduction of private property, slavery, feudalism, 
and capitalism. It justifies on the ground of historical 
necessity the rule of minorities as well as the abolition 
of class-rule by the proletariat. We are indebted for this 
knowledge to Marxism in the strict sense. 

However, this scientific theory, known as Historical 
Materialism, which is substantiated by a critical investiga- 
tion of any period where sufficient economic facts were 
so far available and looked into, does not satisfactorily 
reply to the question, why mental activity is to such a 
determinating degree influenced by economics. Is our 
mind not free to think as it pleases? Such, at least, is 
the belief of most people and even of many socialists who, 
therefore, consider Marxism rather as one-sided and dog- 
matic. 

Thanks to the epistemological researches of Joseph 
Dietzgen, Marxism was here again confirmed and, be- 
sides, expanded. It now culminates in these additional 
proofs : The force of thought operates only by means of 
an inseparable interrelation with material furnished by 
sense perceptions. This material exists not only in 
thought, but also in an objective and perceptible form as a 
part of the cosmos, that universal organism which is the 
premise of all others. Hence all phenomena, including 
the force of thought and the human individual endowed 
with it, are organic members of the cosmos, and this nat- 
ural, infinite, and organic interrelation is the long-sought 
final and unitary explanation for all phenomena. By 
substantiating these theses with his critique of under- 
standing, Dietzgen has furnished the reply to the ques- 



58 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

tion, why it is that within the. universal interrelation 
economics has a predominating influence over mental 
activity. In this way Dietzgen deepened and perfected 
the Marxian conception of social evolution and elaborated 
it into a scientific conception of the world. Herein lies 
the significance of Dietzgen's life's work. 

Dietzgen left no bulky volumes behind him. He was 
not a professional writer, and the struggle for existence 
granted him no leisure, save for occasional writings. So 
much the more valuable is the little that he wrote. The 
fact that his importance for Marxism has not been duly 
recognized so far is partly attributable to Dietzgen's 
great bashfulness and reserve, and to his excessive con- 
fidence in the perspicacity of his readers. Thus, in all 
his works, more particularly in his " Excursions of a 
Socialist into the Domain of the Theory of Understand- 
ing " and in " The Outcome of Philosophy," he gives any 
reader not familiar with the positive work of classic 
philosophers the impression that he is discussing them 
rather than presenting his own researches. Neverthe- 
less, the soberly scientific and cosmic theory of thought 
and conception of the universe presented in these works 
of his are the original achievement of Dietzgen, for which 
his predecessors have naturally built the steps, without, 
however, climbing to the height of this thinker. In order 
that Dietzgen's cosmic and monistic dialectics and its 
particular method of thought and enlightment may be 
used in the service of the proletariat more than heretofore, 
it seems to us appropriate to emphasize at this point, that 
they are a valuable perfection, supplement, and therefore 
development, of Marxism. This is not the place for a 
complete demonstration of our claim. Here we simply 
desire to make use of the outlines of Dietzgen's con- 
sistent monism for an explanation of such terms as re- 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 59 

ligion, conscience, infinity, and conception of the world, 
for which Stirner and the bourgeoisie vainly sought a 
clear and scientific understanding. 

Whoever wishes to get a clear understanding of the 
world and its phenomena, must first grasp the relation of 
the human individual to nature. To this end, again, it 
is indispensable that we should have a clear perception 
of the force, by means of which we seek understanding. 
This is the force of understanding and thought, the 
human mind. 

An analysis of this force shows, that we cannot think 
without any material furnished either in the present or 
the past by sense-perceptions. Thinking signifies, there- 
fore, to operate the force of thought by means of mate- 
rial furnished by present sense-perceptions or by means 
of material of past sense-perceptions stored away in 
memory. This material is an indispensable premise of 
thought. 

This fact may be substantiated by every one who will 
test himself and see whether he or she can formulate any 
thought, which did not originally arise in some way out 
of the contact of the mind with some material perception. 
If any one should present to us any term, which we can- 
not trace to some perceptible fact, then we cannot get 
any meaning out of it aside from the fact that we hear or 
read the mere word and later on repeat it in a similar 
connection without regard to other sense-perception and 
without formulating any clear idea, until we have experi- 
enced the perceptible mate of the mere term in some form. 
Our thought becomes so much clearer and more scientific, 
the more consciously it takes its departure from the crit- 
ique of experienced facts, and vice versa it becomes so 
much more confused, the less we stick to experience and 
yield to imagination, that is to say, the more rein we give 



6fc PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS - 

to inexperienced and therefore inexact reasoning without 
any conscious touch of reality. For this reason thoughts 
which are suggested to children, such as morality, lib- 
erty, justice, god, and devil, have such powerful influence 
over their minds, the same as fairy tales, because children 
are especially apt to assimilate ideas without criticism, 
on account of their untrained faculty of thought and 
their limited experience. What is true in this respect of 
children, applies also to nations in their childhood — fan- 
tastic thought appeals to them more strongly than a sci- 
entific reference to verifiable facts. 

Though Neo-Kantians and garret-philosophers claim 
that the world is merely a matter of consciousness, we 
know now that this is but a half-truth, for the world of 
phenomena exists not only in our consciousness, but also 
outside of it in perceptible reality, otherwise it would not 
exist for us at all. Consciousness does not register any- 
thing that has not been supplied by sense-perceptions. 
Indeed, the universal being, or the universe, consisting of 
intellectually and sensually perceivable phenomena, is 
the primary fact. It is not, in the last analysis, a product 
of man, but on the contrary, man is the product of the 
universe and to this extent the secondary fact. 

We know this to be true as positively as we can know 
anything. In the first place, it is evident, that we human 
beings must first exist, before we can perceive any phe- 
nomenon. We cannot entertain the idea to attempt, 
without the premise of human existence, an analysis of 
the way in which the world of phenomena affects us, and 
to find out whether it exists merely in us as the content 
of our consciousness, or also outside of us as the thing 
which determines our consciousness in the last analysis. 
Otherwise we should not be trying to solve a problem, 
but suffer from insanitv. The existence of man is, there- 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD &i 

fore, the first premise of human thought and research. 

How do we prove, then, that, aside from the existence 
of man, the other premise of the psycho-physical interre- 
lation, or of the inseparable connection of mind and 
senses characteristic of all thought, is the existence of 
material furnished by sense perceptions? That this ma- 
terial does not exist merely in human consciousness, but 
also has its own objective existence and is even the' 
primary fact which produces men and their consciousness 
as secondary phenomena ? 

We answer: Our proof is given in no other way 
than all proofs are, namely, by reference to facts 
which are universally verifiable by experience. Such 
facts would not exist, and there could be neither any 
possibility of understanding nor any science in that case, 
unless there were phenomena outside of us which exist 
independently of individual man, although they can not 
exist for mankind independently of human consciousness. 
It is due only to this obvious fact that one man can con- 
vince another of the reality of som*». objective phenomenon 
and of its existence independently of himself, by making 
another perceive and experience the same phenomenon 
through his senses and intellect. We know and prove 
furthermore, that this same phenomenon still remains 
and continues to exist outside of our mind, even if we, 
as concrete individuals, do not remember and perceive it 
any more with our senses. 

Owing to the fact that man has the intellectual faculty 
of dispensing later on with the objective form of some 
phenomenon previously experienced at a certain time and 
place, and of studying its relations, especially as regards 
its origin and end, without further actual contact with it, 
and seeing that individual phenomena are relative and 
perishable as compared to the absolute universe, philoso- 



62 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

phers have hitherto attempted to disregard also the prem- 
ise of this universe and to penetrate with their studies 
even beyond it. When they did not succeed in this, they 
did not overcome their traditional theological bias in order 
to arrive at the plain understanding that the absolute uni- 
verse is the fundamental premise of their individual ex- 
istence and their force of thought as well as the premise 
of the concrete existence and life of every individual 
phenomenon. On the contrary, their failure induced 
them to return to the mere faith in the supernatural 
existence of a god and finally to the faith in a super- 
natural pure spirit. Particularly since the time of Des- 
cartes (Cartesius) the pure spirit was elevated to the 
position of the only and actual being, while all other 
beings, things or phenomena were reduced to products of 
thought. The senses then appeared in the role of non- 
essential tools of the spirit, transmitting nothing but 
imaginary realities which had no existence, save in 
thought. This is the theological or dualist conception, 
for since it contradicts the experienced mind and all veri- 
fiable facts, and is, therefore, opposed to all science, it 
necessarily had to seek refuge in a divine spirit, or trans- 
form the human mind into an object of supernatural 
faith. By this means absolute dualism, or the contradic- 
tion between thinking and being, was established. Dietz- 
gen finally solved this unreconciled contradiction, by 
pointing out the universally verifiable fact, that every 
individual phenomenon, including man and his force of 
thought, is not of itself whatever it is, but exists only in 
and derives its particularity from the connection with all 
other phenomena of nature, so that this natural and uni- 
versal interrelation, this universal being, is recognized as 
the absolute and uniform premise for every concrete 
phenomenon. Just as in a mathematical problem the 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 63 

solution is contained in the given magnitudes, without 
which the problem could not be solved at all, so the ex- 
istence of the universal being, known as Cosmos, Uni- 
verse or Nature, is the premise for the solution of every 
problem encountered by human beings. The possibility 
of understanding must be contained in the germ in human 
consciousness, for otherwise a more developed conscious- 
ness could never have arrived at it. Man cannot attempt 
to ask himself questions about the nature of conscious- 
ness, until this consciousness has developed. Not until 
man realized after many researches that he would have 
to make a special study of consciousness, did he perceive, 
that the process of thinking takes its departure from 
some given phenomenon furnished by sense-perceptions 
in such a way, that it exists objectively for us as well as 
for all others whose attention is called to it. And if man 
further analyzes a given phenomenon, he finds that, on 
the one hand, it does not enter into his thoughts in all 
its details without leaving anything unknown about it, 
but rather retains its separate existence and can be fur- 
ther perceived by us and others, and, on the other hand, 
that every individual phenomenon does not exist in itself 
alone, but is always a link in that chain of existence 
which we call the universe. It is this chain of existence 
against which the individualist-anarchist bourgeois phi- 
losophers, whose starting point is the free will and inde- 
pendent mind, are rebelling. They do not like to aban- 
don their self-centered aprioristic sailing of the clouds, 
nor trace their steps down to the universal being. In 
such fashion they come by their supernatural aim, the 
faith in some spook by which their own imagination 
deceives them. We, on the other hand, can lead them 
tasily ad absurdum, for we have but to remember that 
thinking is the consciousness of being, an inseparable 



64 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

connection with some object outside of thought, the ex^ 
istence of which may be verified by sense-perceptions. 
Both this phenomenon and our faculty of thought must be 
given, before we can think. But if we have recognized 
that the universal existence outside of our force of 
thought is the absolute premise for our thought, then it 
is simply inane to attempt to go with our mind beyond 
this universal being to where there are neither phenomena 
nor thought. In order not to become inane, we must, 
therefore, make our peace with the universal existence 
and rest content with it. We know, then, that this exist- 
ence is the absolute truth; we no longer search for ab- 
stract truth in general, but rather for the relative truth of 
given phenomena by extracting the general unity from 
the manifold contradictions, by separating the rule from 
the exceptions. And these scientific truths we find ex- 
clusively by a conscious reference to such verifiable parts 
of the universe as become the object of our study. 
We leave pure speculation and faith to the philosophers 
and theologians, and prefer to study and work by means 
of mind and senses. The theological conscience is seen 
to be nothing else but a vague and unconscious memory 
of conceptions that were originally gained in a psycho- 
physical manner. Therefore it belongs in the same class 
with faith and fantasy, and is called conscience as dis- 
tinguished from science. 

The fact that the human mind is compelled to connect 
itself with definite parts of the universe and take its de- 
parture from them in the quest after the general, the 
truth, the rule, or the law, implies that we construct the 
concept of a universe ourselves, recognizing that it con- 
sists of parts which are organically arranged in time and 
space as well side by side as one following the other, 
limiting and supplementing one another. We understand, 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 65 

then, that the universe is the all-combining and all-em- 
bracing organic being, and that the mind, or conscious- 
ness, is one of its parts endowed with the peculiar power 
of serving as an instrument of orientation in the general 
interrelation. The universal existence is therefore recog- 
nized as the fundamental and absolute premise of our 
mind, and of all other phenomena, substances, or forces. 
We can affirm this in such a positive manner, because we 
found by the above test of the force of understanding 
that it can operate only by means of given natural origins 
and facts, and that these origins and facts are members, 
together with the subjective mind, of the infinite inter- 
relations of nature, as any one may ascertain for himself. 

Now we are at last done with speculations about abso- 
lute truth. For we have found it to be the absolute uni- 
verse, the aggregate relations of all phenomena per- 
ceptible to psycho-physical man. Whatever does not 
partake of the psycho-physical nature of the universe, 
cannot exist for us. All spooks disband and stand re- 
vealed as products of fantasy, that is to say, as uncon- 
scious connections of the mind with objective sense- 
perceptions, present or past, provided we test them by a 
conscious combination of the mind with the senses. 

The absolute and sober truth of the universe is recog- 
nized as the absolute eternity, the infinite, all-embracing, 
and all-combining, the thing independent of space and 
time, the beginning and end of all phenomena. The uni- 
verse has all the attributes of divinity without its dualism, 
without that faith which would believe in a supernatural 
mind and a supernatural world apart from the natural 
mind and the natural world. 

Whoever looks about with open eyes, sees that every 
phenomenon of nature is connected organically with 
innumerable others. Every one of them has countless 



66 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

causes, but only one general cause, the universe. In the 
universe we possess at last the reliable, monistic, and, 
therefore, logical beginning and end of a consistent con- 
ception of the world, which harmonizes with all the re- 
sults of science. 

What, then, does our thinking, understanding, ex- 
plaining, etc., accomplish? Evidently nothing else 
than that it explains the cosmic phenomena in their 
direct and indirect interrelations, classifies them and 
arranges them for our orientation and use. The 
mind operates always post factum, that is to say, 
after having been furnished with material by ob- 
jective sense-perceptions. Even prophesying has any 
meaning only when it is a conclusion from definite 
premises. Thinking, understanding, explaining, realiz- 
ing, are so many terms for a formal classification and 
description of the interrelations of given phenomena. 
We think and understand truly when we know how to 
distinguish the essential or general from the unessential 
or exceptional of any given object. And since objective 
reality is the final test, any one can verify whether he has 
been thinking truly, as soon as he compares his thought 
with the available material of the studied object. When- 
ever we can do this, we are independent of any and all 
authority. 

We declare that the universe is an organism, because 
we find it to be a universal fact that every phenomenon is 
that which it is not of itself, but by grace of its inter- 
relation with the universe. A phenomenon is so much 
better understood the more we know about its interrela- 
tions. These change continually in time and space, hence 
a phenomenon does likewise. On account of this eternal 
movement, we are compelled to detach any phenomenon, 
which we desire to study, from out the flow of interrela- 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD &J 

tions, to fix it in time and space. By this means we 
ascertain its direct relations and secure, as it were, a 
flashlight-picture of it as a reference specimen for fur- 
ther studies. In this way we obtain terms for concepts 
and boundaries, or distinctions, in the infinite universe. 
It is the cosmic and organic interrelation of simultaneous 
and successive, eternally changing phenomena, which ex- 
plains the operations of the force of thought, showing 
that this force does not only create distinctions, but is 
also a unifying force aside from its discriminating nature. 

Being a part of the cosmos, the human mind is cosmic, 
partakes of the eternal and infinite nature of the cosmos, 
the same as every substance and force. This universal 
miraculousness is natural for the entire cosmos. How- 
ever, as a cosmic member associated with other cosmic 
members, and compared to the cosmos as a whole, the 
mind is limited in space and time and perishable. Only 
the cosmos as a whole remains unalterable and stable in 
Spite of the eternal transformation of its parts. The in- 
destructibility of matter and the conservation of energy 
are explained by the constancy of the cosmos. This is a 
demand of reason due to critical experience. 

The inductive critique of the force of thought leads us 
to a cosmic dialectics, to an organic interrelation and in- 
terpenetration of all phenomena. It teaches us to con- 
ceive of every phenomenon as an organic part of the 
cosmos, and to make this our point of departure and of 
return as the given absolute truth and the uniform basis. 
The cosmos does not assume the aspect of an aphoristic 
fantasy, because it is the all-embracing and sober reality 
verifiable by every and all experience. The concept of 
the cosmic organism, being consciously constructed out 
of this reality, furnishes us with a basis for a consistent 
monism. It leaves no room for any other but the one 



68 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

and natural cosmos, which is the arch-premise and im- 
passable boundary of our mind. To attempt to go be- 
yond this ultimate boundary of existence is as foolish as 
the idea of ascertaining the nature of consciousness with- 
out any existence. Only he who attempts the one can 
attempt the other, in order to find in the fantasies of pure 
faith a fool's consolation. One who thinks like that is 
nearer to unconsciousness than to consciousness, and this 
is no compliment for his intellectual force. 

"And then, above all other things, 
Give metaphysics due concern. 
Then strive to grasp by deep reflection 
What is beyond the mind's conception." 

These words characterize the essence of the purely 
deductive and unconditional " science." Or, to use an- 
other variation: 

"I tell you this: A man who speculates 
Is like a beast upon some arid heath, 
Led in a circle by some evil sprite, 
While round about is pasture fresh and green." 

The human mind can form abstract concepts only by 
combining impressions derived from concrete objects and 
ascertaining in what respect they are generally identical. 
Hence we do not fully understand abstract concepts, until 
we have had practical intercourse with the concrete phe- 
nomena which are their premise. All concepts are more 
or less abstract and flexible. Because the parts of the 
universe, and our experiences relating to them, are in a 
process of continuous development, our concepts of them 
likewise remain fluid and flexible. The green pasture of 
the concrete phenomena turns into the arid heath of ab- 
stract concepts as soon as we forget the interrelation of 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 69 

the latter with the former. The fact that this interrelation 
has been overlooked in the first place, is due to the cir- 
cumstance that man, overawed by the supreme power of 
nature and the wealth of its phenomena, and feeling his 
dependence upon them, mistook the way of fantasy and 
faith for the only one which would lead to the blessed- 
ness of an explanation of the world satisfactory to the 
mind and heart. The faculty of memory, which per- 
mitted him to retain and collect past impressions, forsook 
him when it would have been proper for him to recollect 
the objective and perceptible origin of all impressions, 
especially after such great abstracta as god, morality, lib- 
erty, immortality, etc., had been instilled in his mind with- 
out criticism for generations in the shape of dogmas or 
eternal truths. It was not until he had reached a high 
stage of development, when an understanding of social 
and natural interrelations had convinced him more and 
more of the passing nature and relative truth of all dog- 
mas, that he restored consciously this psycho-physical 
connection on one field of research after another. Many 
sciences had far advanced before the theory of under- 
standing became scientific. An epoch-making advance 
in this direction is due to Kant, who ascertained that ex- 
perience, that is to say, the interrelation of mind with 
sense-perceptions, is the indispensable premise of all sci- 
ence. But Kant left to faith the task of replying to so- 
called final questions concerning the origin and end of the 
universe and man, because he did not acquire a clear 
understanding of the relation of man to the cosmos. 
Owing to historical conditions, he was still so envel- 
oped by traditional faith, particularly the faith in eternal 
moral law, that he did not even attempt to employ the 
only scientific method, namely, that of consciously con- 
necting the mind with sense-perceptions, for the study 



70 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

of metaphysical riddles. What Kant failed to accom- 
plish was carried further by Dietzgen, thanks to the 
higher social stage on which he stood. Dietzgen's " The 
Nature of Human Brain Work " is devoted to the analy- 
sis of the scientific method of thought. In this little 
work he ascertains that the inductive or empirical method 
of thought is the one peculiar to the force of thought, 
that we cannot in reality think in any other way, but 
merely imagine we are doing so, because meditation is 
nothing else but associative elaboration, by means of mem- 
ory, of the mental material obtained originally from ob- 
jective sense-perceptions. But apart from many allu- 
sions, Dietzgen did not go very far beyond the stand- 
point of historical materialism in applying his method in 
this work, that is to say, he did not explicitly pass from 
the social to the cosmic interrelations. This is done, 
however, in his " Excursions " and in his " Outcome of 
Philosophy." Here he develops the dialectics of Marx 
and Engels, which is a theory of development through 
antagonisms to a higher stage, by perfecting it and point- 
ing out that the universe is the last and highest organic 
unit, which combines monistically all other syntheses. 
By means of this understanding, the dialectics became a 
theory of the cosmic and organic interrelation and inter- 
penetration of all phenomena. While in " The Nature of 
Human Brain Work " it was ascertained that phenomena 
exist outside and independently of individual man, in the 
" Excursions " and the " Outcome of Philosophy " the 
world of phenomena, the universe, or cosmos, were 
shown so to exist. Dialectics in its restricted sense 
found its culminating point in the cosmic interpretation. 
Antagonisms are henceforth recognized as merely rel- 
ative, and the task of the mind is seen to consist in analyz- 
ing this relative nature. In the cosmic basis, we find the 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 71 

explanation of the fact that all antagonisms do not only 
exclude one another, but are also conditioned on one 
another. The point of view of an organic cosmos shows 
that all interrelations are parts of the absolute and come 
into opposition to each other as individual phenomena 
only because they mutually limit one another in time and 
space, being either contemporaneous or succeeding one 
another, in ceaseless flow. While Engels in his " Anti- 
Diihring " endeavors to show by many illustrations that 
the dialectic process is universal, not alone in society, but 
also in nature, Dietzgen reveals by means of his theory of 
understanding, by one stroke, as it were, that the dialectic 
movement is natural to all phenomena, seeing that they 
are all organic parts of the universe. All discoveries of 
natural and social science furnish daily further proofs 
for the correctness of this revelation by Dietzgen. 

Now let us supplement Stirner's negative criticism of 
religion and world-conception positively by means of the 
positive critique of verifiable facts. The theory of under- 
standing elaborated by Dietzgen is our pilot. 

Religion arose from the feeling of human dependence 
on nature. Later this feeling was intensified by the 
equally inevitable feeling of infinity and the need for 
some unifying principle. Driven by his need to search 
for a final explanation of the world's phenomena, but as 
yet unable to see through the interrelations of society and 
nature, man misconstrued the natural final cause into a 
supernatural one. In this way, he created the metaphys- 
ical mode of thought, the absolute distinction between 
the natural and supernatural, which found its modern 
expression in the antagonism between physical matter 
and metaphysical spirit. This dualism is to blame for 
the habit of man to see only the differences, but not the 
interrelations and identities, in making distinctions. Man 



J2 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

reasoned metaphysically, not dialeetically. Stirner felt 
that the former method was wrong, but he did not suc- 
ceed in escaping from metaphysics into physics. For we 
read in his work that he elevated the ego, the psycho- 
physical individual, to the position of the supreme and 
most powerful being. Now, if we mean by the term 
supreme being the most developed member of the cosmic 
organism, then the human individual is doubtless the 
highest being known to us. But inasmuch as every 
fellow-man is an equally supreme being, it follows that 
two men are more supreme and powerful than one. This 
relation of power is the basis of the rule of the majority 
among equals. A society of equals is evidently more 
powerful than any individual member, and the cosmos, 
finally, is more powerful than human society and any 
other phenomenon. Therefore, it is not the individual, 
who in the last analysis determines the world of phenom- 
ena, but it is the cosmos which determines the nature of 
body and soul of the individual. An egoist, who ignores 
the interrelation and interdependence of the individual on 
nature and society, injures himself and the community, 
and is possessed like Stirner. On the other hand, a man 
understanding these relations is useful to himself and 
society, he is a " free " egoist. Stirner is a dogmatist 
of the priestly order, inasmuch as the priestly point of 
view is characterized by the habit of alleging that some 
concrete phenomenon, in this case an individual, is the 
phenomenon in general. Thus we are entangled in the 
meaningless dualism of the concrete and the general, 
while the theory of understanding demonstrates beyond 
peradventure that the general arose out of the concrete, 
that the absolute is composed of the relative, the eternal 
of the temporal, the infinite of finite phenomena. 

Since every part of the universe partakes of its infinite 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 73 

nature, a finite infinity might appear as an absurd contra- 
diction. But this contradiction is solved as soon as we 
consider any concrete phenomenon in relation to the uni- 
verse, in which the former is relative as compared to the 
absolute cosmos. We arrive at the concept of the infinite 
only by means of finite phenomena, in such a way that the 
force of thought is compelled to draw always certain 
lines of distinction, which on closer scrutiny appear as 
merely formal ones. For we may positively range one 
phenomenon after another in line, either downward in 
the dissection of the atom, or upward in the agglomera- 
tion of the universe, without ever coming to a beginning 
or an end. In the same way we arrive at the concept of 
eternity by means of incessant additions of time. The 
concept of an organic universe has at least the same im- 
portance for a scientific conception of the world that the 
changeability of magnitudes to the infinitely small or in- 
finitely great has for higher mathematics, or that the 
scientific role of the atom is playing in chemistry, or the 
molecule in physics. The statement of the fact that our 
mind can take its departure only from objective sense- 
perceptions in order to arrive at general concepts, the 
revelation of this peculiarity of the force of thought, fur- 
nishes us with the basic method for all scientific work, 
namely, the critically inductive method. We have but to 
apply this method consistently in order to find that it 
leads to the dissolution of religion and of all theological, 
purely deductive and dualistic, philosophies. Religion is 
then replaced by the organic conception of the world, 
which satisfies sentimental fantasy as well as sober rea- 
son. The religious feeling of infinity and need of a uni- 
fying principle are satisfied by the understanding of the 
organic universe. Speculative philosophy renounces its 
seat in favor of the science of understanding. The breast 



74 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

of man is delivered from the nightmare of all spooks, 
because at last he may exult freely and acknowledge with 
modest pride that he is a conscious member of society 
and of the universe. Dietzgen's theory of understanding 
completes the victory of Marxism over all priests, philos- 
ophers, anarchists and champions of the dualistic method 
of thought, by supplementing and perfecting the unitary 
and organic conception of society typical of historical 
materialism by the monistic conception of the universe. 
It proves far more thoroughly than the many well- 
founded references to the results of natural science, espe- 
cially of biology, quoted by Haeckel, that tire social deter- 
minism of typical Marxism for the human individual is 
substantiated by the determinism of cosmic interrelations. 
The monism of Haeckel suffers in the first place from 
the fact that he fancies he can discover the peculiar na- 
ture of the force of thought by biological analyses. 
Haeckel does not understand that his biological researches 
will, indeed, supply us with proofs of the inten elation of 
mind and body, but can give but scant information as to 
the peculiar nature of the force of thought. IJe over- 
looks the fact that the force of thought as such can be 
studied only by an analysis of its expressions an4 func- 
tions, so that it is the critique of the faculty in action 
which alone can give us any clues. Apart from the fact 
that Haeckel has taken little heed of the study of social 
interrelations and their laws, so that he imagines that he 
can abolish social evils after the manner of the liberals by 
first educating the masses intellectually, instead of realiz- 
ing that intellectual training can produce such results 
only upon the basis of definite economic conditions, his 
monism is infected by dualistic spooks especially for the 
reason that he has not settled his account fully with the 
crowning result of philosophy, the theory of understand- 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 75 

ing. This becomes particularly plain by his 19th thesis 
for the " organization of Monism," Frankfort on Main, 
1904, where he says : " For our modem science, the 
concept of a god is tenable only on the condition that we 
mean by ' god ' the last unknowable cause of all things, 
the inscrutable hypothetical ' arch-cause of substance.' " 

There we have once again that sad half-heartedness of 
the so-called free-religious, but at bottom still theological 
" ignorabimus" of Dubois-Eeymond, after the tune of: 
" Religion, that is to say, bondage to supernatural ideas, 
must be preserved for the people." 

The reader sees, then, that Haeckel belongs to those 
biased thinkers, who have not become conscious of the 
absolute premise of thought, the existing natural and ob- 
jective reality of the universe. We, on the other hand, 
know, thanks to our understanding of the interrelations of 
the mind, that the law of causality is necessary to the hu- 
man mind merely as one of its forms of explanation, and 
applies indeed to all concrete phenomena of the universe, 
but not to the universe itself, because the latter is its own 
cause and effect, without beginning and end, in short the 
absolute. 

We agree to the natural unknowableness of the known 
final cause of all things. But this natural miraculous- 
ness does not apply to the cosmic final cause alone, but 
also to every one of its phenomena, which are likewise 
inexhaustible. However, it must be emphasized that this 
is merely a trivial and natural miraculousness, which is 
founded in the nature of our force of understanding, for 
this phenomenon of the universe cannot get beyond the 
universe, it cannot exhaustively perceive the nature of 
things either in general or in concrete, and dissolve, as it 
were, the objective reality of any phenomenon by pure 
reason. It is because Haeckel does not explain this point 



?6 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

from the standpoint of a consistent theory of understand- 
ing, that his monism retains a last refuge for the mystic 
faith in a supernatural force of understanding, or a mys- 
tic final cause. But Dietzgen's critique of the force of 
understanding demonstrates, that a supernatural force or 
cause is an absurdity, as every one may verify for him- 
self. Haeckel is one of the most advanced and frank 
liberal thinkers. A proletarian conscious of his position 
in society and the universe is grateful to this prominent 
scientist for his painstaking research on the field of bi- 
ology, which furnishes valuable proofs for the world-con- 
ception of critical communism. But Haeckel's monistic 
half-heartedness in matters of the " final unknowable 
cause of all things " is supplemented on the part of the 
enlightened proletariat by Dietzgen's monistic theory of 
understanding. This theory, coupled to historical ma- 
terialism, offers a reconciliation also to the socalled com- 
munist-anarchist, who is interested in the freest possible 
development of everybody's personality. 

The proletarian conception of the world overcomes 
among other contradictions also the antagonism between 
egoism and altruism, for it is critical communism which 
makes the harmonious development of all the indispen- 
sable condition for the development of the individual. 
Individual powers will reach their highest development 
only when critical communism will have triumphed. 
Then the individual will make all others happy, and vice 
versa. It will be a society of all and of the individual 
on the solid basis of consciously socialized means of pro- 
duction, which were created by the proletariat and organ- 
ized by capitalism. 

Then begins the era of godless freedom, which pro- 
claims that evolutionary revolution will endure for ever. 
The egoistic altruists scatter the clerical, liberal, and so- 



THE PROLETARIAN METHOD 77 

cial priesthood. The cosmic dialectics takes root in the 
heart and brains of men. Objective reality sits victor- 
iously enthroned, and stamps its ruling seal at last, with 
the conscious knowledge of mankind, upon all terms, con- 
ceptions, and actions, which seek favor in the eyes of the 
majority. Dialectically organized society secures the 
freest expression to science and art by abolishing the 
cares for the daily bread. The proletariat is the bearer 
of this greatest of all social movements ever recorded. 
The individual who consciously takes part in it, avows to 
himself: I entrust my affairs to the understanding of 
the laws of society and of the universe, to which I owe 
the knowledge that I must develop my personality, not in 
a struggle against, but in alliance with those social and 
cosmic interrelations, whose proudly modest member I 
am. 

(Translated by Ernest Untermann.) 



PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

SCIENTIFIC SOCIALISM 

(VOLKSSTAAT, 1 873) 

A considerable number of readers of the Volksstaat 
are opposed to elaborate and searching essays in these 
columns. I doubted therefore whether the following 
would be suitable for publication. Let the editor decide. 
Yet I beg to consider whether it is not as valuable to 
engage the more advanced minds and to gain qualified 
thoroughgoing comrades as to strive for great numbers 
by publishing popular articles. Both these aims, I think, 
should be kept in view. If the party is really of opin- 
ion that the emancipation from misery cannot be accom- 
plished by mending particular evils but by a fundamental 
revolution of society, it necessarily follows that an agita- 
tion on the surface is inadequate and that it is moreover 
our duty to undertake an enquiry into the very basis of 
social life. Let us now proceed: 

Contemporary socialism is communistic. Socialism 
and communism are now so near each other that there is 
hardly any difference between them. In the past they 
differed from each other as does liberalism from de- 
mocracy, the latter being in both cases the consistent and 
radical application of the former. From all other po- 
litical theories communistic socialism is distinguished by 
its principle that the people can only be free when they 
free themselves from poverty, when their struggle for 

79 



&0 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

freedom is fought out on the social, i. e., on the economic, 
field. There is this difference between the modern and 
the older socialistic and communistic theories : in the past 
it was the feeling, the unconscious rebellion, against the 
unjust distribution of wealth, which constituted the basis 
of socialism; to-day it is based on knowledge, on the 
clear recognition of our historic development. In the 
past socialists and communists were able only to find 
out the deficiencies and evils of existing society. Their 
schemes for social reconstruction were fantastic. 
Their views were evolved not from the world of realities, 
not from the concrete conditions surrounding them, but 
from their mental speculations, and were therefore whim- 
sical and sentimental. Modern socialism, on the other 
hand, is scientific. Just as scientists arrive at their gen- 
eralizations not by mere speculation, but by observing the 
phenomena of the material world, so are the socialistic 
and communistic theories not idle schemes, but generali- 
zations drawn from economic facts. We see for instance 
that the communistic mode of work is being more and 
more organized by the bourgeoisie itself. Only the dis- 
tribution still proceeds on the old lines and the product 
is withheld from the people. The small production is 
disappearing while production on a large scale takes its 
place. 

Those are facts resulting from the economic develop- 
ment of history and not from any conspiracy of com- 
munistic socialists. If we define work as an industrial 
undertaking whose products the worker uses for his own 
consumption, and an industrial undertaking as the work 
whose products go to the market, then it is not difficult 
to perceive how the development of industry must finally 
result in an organization of productive work. On the 



SCIENTIFIC SOCIALISM 8l 

material organization of society scientific socialism is 
based. 

Scientific socialists apply the inductive method. 
They stick to facts. They live in the real world and not 
in the spiritualist regions of scholasticism. The society 
we are striving for differs from the present but by formal 
modifications. Indeed, the society of the future is con- 
tained in the present society as the young bird is in the 
egg. Modern socialism is as yet more of a scientific doc- 
trine than of a political party creed, though we are also 
rapidly approaching this stage. And strange to say, the 
International is of purely national descent : it proceeds 
from the German philosophy. If there be a grain of 
truth in the prating of " German " science, then the scien- 
tific German can only be found in his philosophic spec- 
ulation. This speculation is on the whole an adventurous 
journey, yet at the same time a voyage of discovery. As 
the clumsy musket of our forefathers represents a neces- 
sary stage to the Prussian needle gun of the present time, 
so the metaphysical speculations of a Leibnitz, Kant, 
Fichte, Hegel are the inevitable paths leading up to the 
scientific proposition, that the idea, the conception, the 
logic or the thinking are not the premise, but the result 
of material phenomena. The interminable discussions 
between idealism and materialism, between nominalists 
and spiritualists on the one hand, and the realists or 
sensualists on the other hand, as to whether the idea was 
produced by the world or the world by the idea, and 
which of the two was the cause or the effect — this dis- 
cussion, I say, forms the essence of philosophy. Its mis- 
sion was to solve the antithesis between thought and be- 
ing, between the ideal and the material. A proof of this 
view I find in the fortnightly review Unsere Zeit for the 
second half of January, 1873, in an essay on intoxicating 



82 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

articles of consumption, as wine, tobacco, coffee, brandy, 
opium, etc. The author, after having stated that the use 
of intoxicants was to be found among all nations, at all 
times and under all conditions of human society, proceeds 
to declare that the cause of that fact must be looked for 
there, " where the cause of all religion and philosophy 
lies, in the antithesis of our being, in the partly divine, 
partly animal nature of man." This antagonism between 
divinity and animality in human nature is in other words 
the antithesis between the ideal and the material. Re- 
ligion and philosophy work towards a reconciliation of 
those conflicting principles. Philosophy proceeded from 
religion and began to rebel against its conception of life. 
In religion the idea is the primary element which creates 
and regulates matter. Philosophy, the daughter of re- 
ligion, naturally inherited a good deal of her mother's 
blood. She needed ages of growth to generate the anti- 
religious, scientific result, the apodictically safe proposi- 
tion, that the world is not the attribute of spirit, but, on 
the contrary, that spirit, thought, idea is only one of the 
attributes of matter. Hegel, it is true, did not carry 
science to that height, yet so near was he to it that two 
of his followers, Feuerbach and Marx, scaled the sum- 
mit. The clearing up of speculation helped Feuerbach 
to give us his wonderful analysis of religion, and en- 
abled Marx to penetrate the deepest recesses of law, pol- 
itics and history. When we see, however, Herbart, 
Schopenhauer, Hartman, etc., still going on speculating 
and philosophizing, we cannot regard them as more than 
stragglers, lost in the phantastic depth of their own 
thoughts, lagging behind in the back-woods and not 
knowing that the speculative fire has been overcome in 
the front. On the other hand, Marx, the leader of scien- 
tific socialism, is achieving splendid success by apply- 



SCIENTIFIC SOCIALISM 83 

ing inductive logic to branches of knowledge which have 
hitherto been maltreated by speculation. As far back as 
the year 1620 Francis Bacon declared in his " Novum 
Organon " the inductive method as the savior from un- 
fruitful scholasticism and as the rock on which modern 
science was to be built. 

Indeed, where we have to deal with concrete phenom- 
ena, or, as it were, with palpable things, the method of 
materialism has long since reigned supremely. Yet, it 
needed more than practical success : it needed the the- 
oretical working-out in all its details in order to com- 
pletely rout its enemy, the scholastic speculation or 
deduction. In his famous " History of Civilization in 
England " Thomas Buckle speaks at great length of the 
difference between the deductive and inductive mind, 
without, as it seems, having grasped the essence of the 
matter ; he but proves what he admits himself in the intro- 
duction to his work that, though having made German 
philosophy a serious study, he did not fully penetrate it. 
If this happens to ripe and ingenious scholarship, what 
shall become of immature and superficial general knowl- 
edge which deals not with specialties but with the general 
results of science ? In order to indicate clearly the scien- 
tific basis of socialism, I venture to enter more fully into 
the general result of philosophy, into the solution of the 
antithesis between the deductive and inductive method. 
But I fear lest the result of metaphysics, so ostenta- 
tiously announced, may appear to the reader as some- 
what insignificant and commonplace. I beg, there- 
fore, to remind you of Columbus who by means of an egg 
once for all furnished the proof that great discoveries 
resolve themselves into an ingenious, yet simple, idea. 

When we retire to the solitude of our cell to search 
there in deep contemplation, or, as it were, in the inner- 



84 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

most of our brains, for the right way we want to follow 
the next morning, we must remember that our mental 
effort can be successful only because of our previous, if 
involuntary, experiences and adventures which we, by 
help of our memory, have taken along into our cell. 

That tells the whole story of philosophic speculation or 
deduction. These philosophers imagine they have drawn 
their theories, not from concrete material, but from the 
innermost of their brains, while, as a matter of fact, they 
have but performed an unconscious induction, a process 
of thought, of argument not without material, but with 
indefinite and therefore, confused material. Con- 
versely, the inductive method is distinguished only by 
this that its deduction is done consciously. Scientific 
" laws " are deductions drawn by human thinking from 
empiric material. The spiritist needs material just as the 
materialist needs spirit. This thesis, when brought out 
with mathematical precision, is the result of philosophic 
speculation. 

That may appear simple enough, yet even a cursory ex- 
amination of any of our reviews will teach us how little 
familiar that truth is not only to our journalists and 
writers but also to our historians and statesmen who 
are untiring in their attempts to evolve views and theses 
not from the existing conditions but from their heads, 
hearts, consciences, categorical imperatives or from some 
other unreal, mystical and spiritual corner. The con- 
crete questions of the day are, as a rule, solved by, or 
with the help of, given material. But in the discussion 
with Bismarck whether might goes before right or con- 
versely; in the squabbles of theology whether the gods 
are made by the world or the world by the gods ; whether 
catechisms or natural sciences enlighten the mind; 
whether history moves upward to a higher stage or goes 



SCIENTIFIC SOCIALISM 85 

down to its Day of Judgment ; in political and economic 
questions : whether capital or labor creates value, whether 
aristocracy or democracy is the right form of government, 
whether we have to work on conservative, liberal or rev- 
olutionary lines ; in short, in abstract categories, in mat- 
ters of philosophy, religion, politics and social life, our 
leaders of science find themselves in the most unscientific 
confusion. They test human institutions by such prin- 
ciples or ideas as the idea of justice, of liberty, of truth, 
etc. " We," says Frederick Engels, " describe things as 
they are. Proudhon, on the other hand, wants our pres- 
ent society to arrange itself, not according to the laws of 
its economic development, but in conformity with the 
precepts of justice/' Proudhon is in this respect the 
prototype of all unscientific doctrinairism. 

A far superior guide in all such questions is modern 
socialism. Owing to its philosophical foundation it 
stands out prominently as a unanimous, firm and compact, 
method amidst the endless and shifting dissensions of its 
political opponents of every shade and opinion. What the 
dogma is to the religious belief, material facts are to the 
science of inductive socialism, while the views of liber- 
alism are as whimsical and elusive as the ideal concep- 
tions, as the ideas of eternal justice or liberty on which 
the liberals believe to be safely based. 

The fundamental proposition of inductive socialism 
may be thus formulated : there is no eternal principle or 
an a priori idea of the divine, just and free; there is no 
revelation or a chosen people, but there are material fac- 
tors which govern human society. 

Far from bewailing that fact, we acknowledge it as ab- 
solutely necessary and reasonable, as something which 
may be denied by power of imagination, but which can- 
not be altered, nor, indeed, ought it to be altered. By 



86 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

granting that society is dominated by material interests 
we do not deny the power of the ideals of the heart, 
mind, science and art. For we have no more to deal 
with the absolute antithesis between idealism and ma- 
terialism, but with their higher synthesis which has been 
found in the knowledge that the ideal depends on the ma- 
terial, that divine justice and liberty depend on the 
production and distribution of earthly goods. In the 
wide range of human needs the bodily ones are the most 
indispensable; our physical needs must first be sat- 
isfied before we are able even to think of our mental 
ones and those of our heart, eye and ear. The 
same holds good in the life of nations and parties. 
Their abstract conceptions depend on the way they make 
their living. Tribes living by warfare and booty have 
not the same heaven, the same sense of justice or of 
liberty as our patriarchs are supposed to have had who, 
as is well known, were living on cattle-breeding. Knights 
and monks had notions of righteousness, of virtue and 
honour which were decidedly illiberal and anti-bourgeois, 
because their means of life were not supplied by factory 
labor and financial transactions. 

Of course, the defenders of Christianity strongly ob- 
ject to those views. In order to prove the independence 
of spirit from matter and of philosophy from economics 
they make the assertion that the same Christian truth is 
invariably taught to all sorts and conditions of men, and 
under all climes. They forget, however, how they 
trimmed the sails to the wind. They forget likewise 
that the love preached by the apostles and churchfathers 
— the love which gave away the second coat is no more 
the many-coated love under the overcoat which strips the 
poor to the skin — of course, rightfully. To the diverse 
modes of property and trade correspond diverse Chris- 



SCIENTIFIC SOCIALISM 87 

tianities. The institution of slavery in U. S. A. was 
Christian, and Christianity was slave-holding there. The 
religious reformation of the sixteenth century was not 
the cause, but the effect, of the social reformation that 
followed upon the shifting of the economic center from 
the manor to the city. And that was preceded by the rise 
of navigation and the discovery of the New World and 
new trade-routes, which indicate the rise of manufacture. 
Industrial life having no use for ascetic bodies introduced 
the protestant doctrine of grace that abolished religious 
exercises in favor of stern industrial work. 

That the materialist conception of history is scientific 
induction and not idle speculation manifests itself even 
more clearly when we apply it to political party prob- 
lems. With its help the tangled mass of party strug- 
gles can be easily unravelled into a clear, running thread. 
The squire is enthusiastic over the absolute monarchy 
because the absolute monarchy cared for the squirearchy. 
Manufacturers, merchants, bankers, in short, capitalists 
are liberal or constitutional, for constitutionalism is the 
political expression of capitalism, which liberalizes trade 
and commerce, supplies the factories with free labor, 
promotes banking and financial transactions, and, in gen- 
eral, takes care of the interests of industrial life. Phil- 
istines, shopkeepers, small tradesmen and peasants join 
alternately one party or the other according to the prom- 
ises made with regard to the promotion of their well- 
being and to the relief from the effects of competition 
with big capital. 

The familiar accusation of political hypocrisy which 
the Parliamentary parties throw at each other was sug- 
gested to Bismarck by one of the renegades of our camp 
whom he likes to employ. That accusation is based on 
the recognition that the aristocratic and middle class con- 



88 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

sciousness was formed by the material requirements of 
the landed and manufacturing and trading classes, and 
that behind their idealistic watchwords of religion, pa- 
triotism, freedom and progress lurks the concrete in- 
terest as the motor power. I cannot deny that many 
of their followers are not conscious of their real motives, 
and that they sincerely believe their political work to be 
purely idealistic. But I should like to remark that it is 
with recognitions as with epidemics, they are in the air 
and people feel them somehow. Indeed, the political hy- 
pocrisy of our time is half conscious, half unconscious. 
There are many people who take the ideological phrases 
as gospel truth, but also the artful are by no means rare 
who want them to be taken as such. The matter can be 
easily explained. Different classes, distinguished by 
their different material conditions, succeed each other to 
political power. The interests of the ruling class are 
always for a certain time in harmony with the interests 
of the community, that is with the progressive forces of 
civilization. And it is that harmony which justifies the 
ruling class in regarding itself as the spring of social 
welfare. However, the onward march of history 
changes everything, also the justification for ruling 
power. When the economic interests of the ruling class 
cease to be in harmony with the general welfare, when 
the ruling class loses its functions and falls into decay, 
then its leaders can only save their predominant posi- 
tion by hypocrisy ; their phraseology has been emptied of 
all reality. It is no doubt true that some individuals rise 
above class interests and join the new social power which 
represents the interest of the community. So did Abbe 
Sieves and Count de Mirabeau in the French Revolution, 
who, though belonging to the ruling classes, became the 
advocates of the third Estate. Still, these are excep- 



SCIENTIFIC SOCIALISM 89 

tions proving only the inductive rule that, in social as in 
natural science, the material precedes the ideal. 

It may appear rather contradictory to make the Heg- 
elian system of philosophy with its pronounced idealism 
the starting point of the materialist conception of his- 
tory. Yet, the Hegelian " Idea " is striving for real- 
ization; it is indeed a materialism in disguise. Con- 
versely, the Hegelian reality appears in the mask of the 
u Idea," or of the logical conception. In one of the latest 
issues of Blatter fur Unterhaltung Herr J. Volkelt 
makes the following remark : " Our modern thinkers 
have to submit to the crucial test of empiricism. The 
Hegelian principle has no reason to be afraid of such a 
test. Consistently followed up it means that the spirit of 
history can only be conceived through the existing ma- 
terial." Gleams of truth like these we can find now 
here and there in the periodical literature, but for a con- 
sistent and systematic application of the theory we must 
go to scientific socialism. The inductive method draws 
its mental conclusion from concrete facts. Scientific 
socialism considers our views dependent upon our ma- 
terial needs, and our political standpoint dependent upon 
the economic position of the class we belong to. More- 
over, this conception corresponds with the aspirations of 
the masses whose needs are in the first place material, 
while the ruling class must necessarily base itself on the 
deductive principle, on the preconceived unscientific no- 
tion that the spiritual salvation and the mental training 
of the masses are to precede the solution of the social 
question. 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL-DEMOCRACY* 

SIX SERMONS 
(VOLKSSTAAT, 187O to 1 875) 

L 

Friends and Fellow-Citizens: The teachings of Social- 
ism contain the material for a new religion which, un- 
like any other religion, appeals not merely to the heart 
and emotions, but at the same time to the brain, the 
organ of knowledge. From all other earthly knowledge 
socialism is distinguished by its religious form, by its 
fervid appeal to the heart and soul of man. Generally 
speaking the object of religion is to save the suffering 
soul from the gloom and misery of earthly life. This 
object it has thus far realized only in an unreal and fan- 
tastic manner, by referring us to an invisible God and to 
a Kingdom inhabited by ghosts. The gospel of to-day 
promises to save us from misery in a real and palpable 
way. God, that is the Good, the Beautiful and the Holy, 
is to be made man, and is to descend from heaven unto 
the earth, not as in the days of old in the flame of religion 
and in the spell of wonder, but in reason and reality. We 
want our saviour, our Word, to become flesh, and to be 
materialized not in one individual only. All of us de- 
sire, the people want to become sons of God. 

* Used here and later on in the wider sense of the word as the most 
prominent representation of militant Socialism. The reader may, therefore, 
safely change " The Religion, Ethics and Philosophy of Social Democracy " 
into: Socialism and Religion, Ethics, Philosophy. — Editor. 

90 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 91 

Religion was until now a matter for the dispossessed. 
Now, however, the matter of the dispossessed is becom- 
ing religion, that is something which takes hold of the 
whole heart and soul of those who believe. The new 
faith, the faith of the proletariat, revolutionizes every 
thing, and transforms after the manner of science, the old 
faiths. In opposition to the olden times we say, Sun, 
stand thou still, and Earth, move and transform! In 
the old religion man served the gospel, in the new relig- 
ion the gospel is to serve man. In order to emancipate 
humanity from religion not only vaguely but distinctly 
and really, it is necessary to overcome religion by analyz- 
ing and fully comprehending it. The new gospel asks 
for a thorough revision of the whole system of our 
thought. According to the old revelation the law was 
the primary, the supreme and the eternal, and man the 
secondary element. 

According to the new revelation man is the primary, 
the supreme and the eternal, and the law the secondary, 
temporary and transitory element. 

We do not live for the sake of the law, but, on the 
contrary, the law exists for our sake, to serve us, and 
to be modified according to our needs. The old gospel 
required of us patience and submissiveness ; the new gos- 
pel requires of us energy and activity. In the place of 
grace it puts conscious work. The old bible was named 
authority and faith; the new has for its title revolution- 
ary science. 

Faith and science, my dear friends, form the contradic- 
tion which separates the old from the new gospel. Those 
who have clearly grasped this distinction are incipient 
socialists, even if they have not penetrated to the political 
or social consequences springing from it. This distinction 
between faith and science contains the germ of revolu- 



$2 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

tionary development. Both pursue the same end, the 
salvation of mankind, yet their ways are as poles as- 
sunder. Faith refers us to fancy and imagination, 
science to reason and reality. 

Our opponents, the scribes and pharisees of the old 
gospel, stand and fall with the dogmas of their faith: 
they are past redemption. Those, however, who stand 
on the ground of science, submit their judgment to the 
crucible of facts ; they are the followers of the new gos- 
pel. The struggle between faith and science, the antag- 
onism between the old and the new gospel, dates by no 
means from the days of socialism. It goes back to the 
ancient world, to the beginnings v of scientific research, 
then it revives with the renaissance and grows more and 
more with the approach of the present era where it finds 
its embodiment in our leaders of scientific thought, 
though it reaches its full development only in the modern 
labor movement. 

All great movements of the past were but the fore- 
runners, the preliminaries of the general movement, of 
the coming great revolution whose birth we are wit- 
nessing. Greek civilization and Christianity, the Ref- 
ormation, the French revolution of 1789, philosophy and 
modern science are mere instruments, but industry is the 
great architect, and socialism the lofty structure which 
the nations of our time are rearing. The history of the 
past has diligently collected the necessary materials, and 
now, friends, the time has come to dig up the soil and 
to lay the foundations. 

Valuable as the labors of the past may be, they are 
but fanciful ornaments in comparison with the funda- 
mental work the future has to carry out. 

" Man is free, even were he born in chains." This say- 
ing of Schiller needs correction. For man is born in 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 93 

chains and must struggle for freedom. The heaviest 
chains, the strongest fetters were put on him by Nature. 
Against her tyranny he struggles from the beginning of 
his days. Sustenance and apparel he must wrest from 
her. The whip of dire necessity in her hand she stands 
over him, and on her whims and frowns his existence 
depends. It was the tyranny of Nature which gave re- 
ligion that predominant influence over the soul of man. 
Religion promised him relief from the heavy hand of 
Nature. How long and anxiously did Judaism wait for 
the Kingdom of the Messiah! "Consider the ravens: 
for they neither sow nor reap; which neither have store- 
house nor barn; and God feedeth them; how much are 
ye better than the fowls ? " Praying and fasting are the 
means recommended by Christianity against the inborn 
helplessness of man. Through the whole of the mid- 
dle ages that advice was faithfully acted upon, until its 
futility became manifest. With the appearance of Lu- 
ther religious thought changes. He proclaimed that 
Christ had performed for us in heavenly grace our re- 
ligious salvation, thus relegating sacred exercises to 
Sundays chiefly and giving free the week-days for sober 
work. His challenge to the medieval Church heralds the 
era of industrial activity. Even though his followers 
afterwards misrepresented his teachings and though Lu- 
ther himself left his work but half finished, it is neverthe- 
less true that with the Eeformation man starts out on 
a new earthly practice, the salvation through Labor 
without exactly giving up his theories about heaven. He 
works, accumulates wealth, and with the accumulated 
wealth he rises to the height of a new conception, to the 
gospel of social salvation. 

Religion has since time immemorial been so much 
cared for and hallowed, that even those minds who have 



94 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

given up the belief in a personal God, in a supreme pro- 
tector of mankind, still adhere to some sort of religion. 
Let us for the sake of those conservatives use the old 
word for the new thing. This is not only a concession 
made to prejudice in order the more easily to overcome 
it, but is also justified by the thing itself. Indeed, re- 
ligions differ not more nor less from each other than 
all of them from the anti-religious social-democracy. All 
religions have this in common, that they strive for the 
salvation of suffering humanity, and to lead it up to the 
good, the beautiful, the righteous and the divine. Well, 
social-democracy is all the more the true religion as it 
strives for the very same end, not in a fantastic way, 
not by praying and fasting, wishing and sighing, but in 
a manner positive and active, real and true, by the social 
organization of manual and mental work. 

Work is the name of the new Redeemer. 

Christ made a great number of proselytes long be- 
fore the church was established, so did in many cen- 
turies the new redeemer, Work, before he could in our 
present age think to ascend the throne and to take the 
sceptre into his hand. Now he is endowed with the at- 
tributes of the Godhead, with power and knowledge. 
He did not come to his glory in an immaculate and 
miraculous way. He is born in pains, and grown up in 
struggle and affliction and sorrow. Although it is he 
who civilizes man and cares for him, and comes with 
the promise to fully release him from the bonds of slav- 
ery, and actually shows him the longed-for new land from 
afar, yet the crown of thorns is on his brow and the 
cross of contempt on his shoulders. 

However, let us drop parables and allegories, and do 
away with metaphorical language. The thing is much 
too great and too prominent to need mystical drapery,. 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 95 

We deal here with the salvation of mankind in the truest 
sense of the word. If there be anything holy, here we 
stand before the holy of holiest. It is neither a fetish 
nor an ark of the covenant, neither a tabernacle nor a 
monstrance. It is the real, positive salvation of the 
whole civilized humanity. This salvation was neither 
invented nor revealed, it has grown out of the accumu- 
lated labor of history. It consists in the wealth of to- 
day which arose glorious and dazzling in the light of 
science, out of the darkness of barbarism, out of the op- 
pression, superstition and misery of the people, out of 
human flesh and blood, to save humanity. This wealth, 
in all its palpable reality, is the solid foundation of the 
hope of social-democracy. 

The wealth of to-day does not consist in the superb 
mansions, inhabited by the privileged of society, nor 
does it consist in their costly apparel, or in the gold and 
the precious stones of their jewelry, or in the heaps of 
goods peeping through the show windows of our great 
cities. All that as well as the coin and bullion in the 
trunks and safes form but an appendix or, so to speak, 
the tassels and tufts, behind which the wealth is con- 
cealed — the rock on which our hope is built. 

What authorizes the people to believe in the salvation 
from the long ages of torture — nay, not only to believe 
in, but to see it, and actively to strive for, is the fairy- 
like productive power, the prodigious fertility of human 
labor. In the secrets which we have wrung from Na- 
ture ; in the magic formulas by which we force her to do 
our wishes and to yield her bounties almost without any 
painful work on our part; in the constantly increasing 
improvement of the methods of production — in this I 
say, consists the wealth which can accomplish what no 
redeemer ever could. 



g6 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

All exertion and struggle in human history, all aspira> 
tions and researches of science find their common aim in 
freedom of man, in the subjection of Nature under the 
sway of his mind. 

What is freedom? Is it a phantom of which the 
German poet Schenkendorf sings, " Freedom as I un- 
derstand it/' and of which, strictly speaking, only the 
name is known; after which the revolutionists of 1848 
were hankering, like a boarding-school miss after some 
chivalrous knight? And verily, also those have but a 
philistine conception of its sublime character, who but 
see in it freedom from police interference or freedom of 
competition, of conscience, of speech, of organization and 
of public meetings. All that is but the fringe of free- 
dom. Our Liberals and Progressives, who only fight for 
that tinsel, have long ago deprived the people of all real- 
ity of freedom which they consider as their exclusive 
privilege. What we want and what the Liberals largely 
possess in superabundance is freedom from the bonds of 
slave-labor, freedom from poverty, misery and sorrow, 
freedom from starvation and ignorance, freedom from 
the curse of being the beast of burden to the 
" higher classes " — this freedom for the masses of toil- 
ing humanity is the sacred aim which modern society 
could attain to by the infinite productivity of human 
labor. 

Man, to be sure, is still dependent on Nature. Her 
tribulations are not as yet all overcome. Culture has yet 
a good deal to do; aye, its work is endless. But we 
have so far mastered the dragon, that we finally suc- 
ceeded in forging the weapon with which it can be sub- 
dued ; we know now the way to tame the beast into a use- 
ful domestic animal. From praying and fasting we have 
turned to thinking and working. The result of the 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 97 

change of method is plainly visible in the conquests of 
modern industry, whose soul is the productivity of our 
labor. 

The hardships of mankind were perhaps until now 
inevitable, considering that there was no power to mitigate 
them. It certainly required thousands of years of de- 
velopment to bring forth that power. As long as the 
labor of the people was not fruitful enough to satisfy 
the needs of the masses, certain classes could usurp the 
privilege of governing the land. I am even inclined to 
go further and to admit that the task of developing our 
labor power to that degree of prodigious fertility which 
we see to-day, has necessitated a privileged governing 
class as well as the exploitation of the masses. I am thus 
ready to acquiesce patiently in the misery of the past, and 
bear it no grudge or malice. But all the more I am now 
justified in pressing forward the claims of social-de- 
mocracy. The people are striving for real salvation, be- 
cause the conditions are ready for it. Poverty, starva- 
tion and misery in the past were quite often the inevitable 
results of the deficiency of production. Now, or to be 
more accurate, since the second decade of the nineteenth 
century the case is quite the reverse : it is the superfluity 
of wealth, as manifested in the recurring periods of com- 
mercial and industrial depression, which interferes with 
production. However full the granaries and ware- 
houses may be with goods of all kind, the people starve 
and freeze, because the possessing classes, satiated with 
wealth, do not require their labor power. The world is 
over-populated (hear! hear!), say our professors and pol- 
iticians. Yes, the world is over-populated, because the 
means of sustenance can be so easily gotten. Human 
history had until now the task to organize production, to 
unfold labor power, to economize, and to produce wealth. 



98 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

To achieve that purpose, civilization used man ruth- 
lessly as a tool. As far as that task can be fulfilled by 
means of oppression, it has been fulfilled. Civilization 
was until now the aim, and man the means of history. 
The time has now come to revert the case and to make 
man the end, and civilization the means. The prime ne- 
cessity to an advance in civilization is freedom of the 
people to participate in consumption. Only occasionally 
and exceptionally there is suffering from a lack of sup- 
ply, but generally and as a rule we witness misery 
caused by an abundance of goods in quest of consumers. 
Owing to free competition this abundance, called na- 
tional wealth, has been the means to reduce prices and 
thus to stimulate advanced methods of production by the 
introduction of labor and cost-saving machinery. How- 
ever, in consequnce thereof those who were unable to 
compete went to the wall and the purchasing power of 
society decreased. So it came about that wealth, once 
the stimulator of progress, is now turning into a factor 
of historical stagnation. 

Some of you, dear friends, may think that I see some- 
thing which is not warranted by fact. However great 
wealth might be, it was by no means so abundant as to 
stifle production and to deprive the laborer of his em- 
ployment. 

To be sure, new factories are being built and the old 
ones prosper ; new railways, shipping lines and canals are 
being opened, and the land does not go out of cultiva- 
tion. Yet all this is but the appearance, and not the 
reality of things, because truth is veiled by seeming con- 
tradictions. He who has eyes to see, sees the general 
tendency, despite the particular contradiction he sees the 
superfluity and the retrenchment of industry, despite the 
fact that the chimneys continue to pour forth smoke. 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 99 

What does not move as rhythmically as its nature re- 
quires, is lame. And who could deny that there is both 
the need and the power to expand production to many 
times its present dimensions? No matter how great or 
small the present improvements of agriculture or of ma- 
chinery may be, on the whole it must be admitted that the 
growth of production is kept in check by the question of 
consumption. The salvation of humanity is involved in 
this question. It is so great and sublime, that all other 
problems which time may bear in its folds must wait in 
silence. The whole of old Europe is waiting with bated 
breath for the fulfilling of things which are coming. 

The political events are but the surface, but a rip- 
ple of what is raging in the depths of history, at the 
bottom of social life. He who has eyes to see, sees 
how every rising tide of freedom has in the last decades 
been thrown back by an ebb twice as strong. In all 
leading countries of Europe every political step forward 
is followed by a forcible reaction. The tri-colored free- 
dom alternates with Caesarism, Republics with Empires, 
lively enthusiasm with flabby apathy, each new era of lib- 
eralism is followed by a Bismarck. The English Parlia- 
ment disestablishes the Irish Church and carries Crimes 
Acts which exceed in severity Prussian martial law. 
France, in the person of M. Ollivier, 1 shows a strange at- 
titude. Standing fast on one leg, she moves the other 
forward and backward, as if working the spinning- 
wheel of time. The wheel is diligently kept in motion, 
but no yarn comes out of it. Neither in Paris, nor in 
London, neither in Madrid nor in Naples, neither in Ber- 
lin nor in Vienna. O, ye short-sighted and narrow- 
minded, who cannot give up the fad of the moderate 
organic progress ! Don't you perceive that all your great 

1 This was written before the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War, 1870. 



100 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

liberal passions sink to the level of mere trifling, because 
the great question of social salvation is on the order 
of the day? Don't you perceive that struggle and de- 
struction must precede peace and construction, and that 
chaotic accumulation of material is the necessary condi- 
tion of systematic organization just as the calm precedes 
the tempest and the latter the general purification of the 
air? Neither the emancipation of nationalities nor that 
of women, neither the reorganization of school nor that 
of education in general, neither the reduction of standing 
armies nor that of taxation — neither of those demands 
can be satisfactorily taken in hand before the working 
class is freed from the fetters which keep them riveted to 
starvation, sorrow and misery. History stands still, be- 
cause she gathers force for a great catastrophe. 

Social-democracy believes in the conquering power of 
truth, hopes for the salvation from material and mental 
slavery, and deeply desires justice for all. 

The practical and the successful, the pharisees and 
the scribes, the selfish and the hypocrites think us there- 
fore hopelessly fantastic. They argue that there have 
always been lucky and unlucky, rich and poor, master 
and servants, and they illogically conclude that this state 
of things will endure forever and ever. They don't con- 
ceive the possibility of salvation, because they don't un- 
derstand the people. The people are not a mass of pleas- 
ure-seeking loafers. They despise the finery of your 
pseudo-culture. They desire a systematic organization 
of our economic life which shall make impossible the 
gluttony of the few and the privations of the many, but 
which shall secure plenty of the necessaries for all. 
Our kingdom differs toto coelo from yours. And 
your kingdom, the social order of to-day, have you con- 
structed it consciously, or is it not true that you have 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY IOI 

organized it instinctively, experimentally, in the course of 
centuries? Consider the frugal needs of our people and 
at the same time the modern fertility of labor, and ask 
yourselves if the instinct alone would not be sufficient to 
teach us how to supply adequately our needs with the help 
of the existing means of production? However, social- 
democracy does not rely on instinctive feeling only. In 
contradistinction to the present system of production 
which works without clear purpose and measure, social- 
democracy is based on a clear comprehension of the scope 
and the tendencies and the aims of modern economic life 
according to which it consciously attempts to reconstruct 
human society. 

Conscious, systematic organisation of social labor is 
the redeemer of modern times. 

II. 

Before we proceed with our thesis let us, dear friends, 
sum up in a few words the essence of our first sermon. 
In the social-democratic movement we have found a new 
form of religion, inasmuch as both are striving for the 
same end : the salvation of man from poverty with which 
he helplessly began his struggle for existence in the midst 
of a world of adversities. Even the most superstitious 
soul cannot claim for religion more than the success of 
spiritual salvation. The pagan gods have scarcely any 
share in that spiritual world, while the Tri-personal God 
of Christianity could only mitigate the misery of the peo- 
ple by making it a virtue. I shall not deny that this 
doctrine was beneficial for a time. As long as man 
had neither the capacity nor the means to throw off his 
cross, resignation was not only a divine balm, but also 
an effective discipline which trained him for the rigorous 



102 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

mental work civilization requires. Mind was cultivated 
by religion. But what purpose could such a culture 
serve if it didn't enable us to cultivate the real world 
and to improve material conditions with the help of the 
mind? I am quite aware, my friends, that Christianity 
disowns this only earthly reason of its existence; I am 
quite aware, that Christianity claims its Kingdom not to 
be of this world, and that its only mission was the sal- 
vation of our immortal soul. We know, however, that 
we do not always achieve what we intend to achieve, 
and that we don't really always do what we mean to do. 
We distinguish intentions from realizations. And the 
materialistic social-democrat has made it his special duty, 
to judge people not by their flashes of thought, but by 
their palpable actions. Indeed, the aim of religion can 
only be attained by material culture, by a cultivation of 
the material. Work we called the redeemer of humanity. 
Science and mechanical arts, mental and manual labor, 
are, like God-father and Son, two different forms of one 
and the same being. This truth I should like to call the 
cardinal dogma of the social-democratic church, if so- 
cial-democracy could be called a church, and reasonable 
knowledge a dogma. Science has been an idle speculation 
as long as it didn't reach the truth that thinking, perceiv- 
ing and learning required external objects and sense-im- 
pressions. The combination of the activity of the brains 
and the senses distinguishes natural science from all an- 
cient speculative sciences. The science of the ancients was 
largely speculation, that is, they believed it possible to 
evolve truth by mental activity alone, without the help of 
external objects and experience. But the result thus ob- 
tained was no science. No wonder, that the contents of 
many a library of folio-volumes with their wooden and 
pigskin bindings have now chiefly an antiquarian value, 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY IO3 

On the other hand, the craftsmen of the past did not 
sever manual from mental labor, and though their hand- 
work has largely been consumed or damaged, yet the 
science of those practical investigators has been carefully 
guarded by tradition and handed down, nearly unim- 
paired, from generation to generation. There are among 
us a good many people who, instead of regarding science 
as a handmaid to civilization, idolize and worship it with 
boundless and servile admiration as something preternat- 
ural. They are like the barbarians who turned the nat- 
ural and social law into a divinity and thus deprived them- 
selves of the power to control that law and to use it 
for the benefit of mankind. It is incumbent upon so- 
cial-democracy to destroy both the religious and the 
scientific superstition. Man shall not look up to science, 
but shall draw it down to earthly purposes. The mental 
shall be the tool of manual labor. With this we by 
no means disparage the just claims of science. 
The manifest futility of mere speculative brooding, 
the demonstrated barrenness of pure reason, may 
be a lesson for the learned profession, that there can be 
no science without the action of our senses upon ma- 
terial objects. Conversely, let the craftsmen learn from 
the wonderful results of modern industry that labor 
needs the co-operation of science. 

The mutual permeation going on for centuries of those 
two forms of activity helped humanity to reach that point 
where the foundation-stone to the temple of social-de- 
mocracy can be laid. It consists in the power of our 
material production, in the productivity of modern in- 
dustry. But let us take care not to think in this con- 
nection of mental power only! The labor, which has 
been accumulated in the course of ages, does not con- 
sist of mental or scientific achievements only, but to a 



104 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

much higher degree in the material wealth existing 
around us, insofar as it constitutes a necessary instru- 
ment of modern labor. Although this instrument or 
wealth is at present under the control of private individ- 
uals, yet the social-democrat must learn to conceive that 
it could not be the creation of private efforts. All our 
material wealth as well as our scientific and literary 
achievements can only be due to the collective work of 
many and various generations, countries and races, and 
is therefore, despite the private control under which it is 
at present, the collective product of all. 

Great inventions and discoveries, which are bound up 
with certain names, are but nominally the property of 
those famous individuals. They are in fact, like the 
material achievements, the result of collective labor, the 
product of society. And it is but a survival of the bar- 
barian past to regard great historic names not only 
as brilliant leaders, but also as demigods, though such 
opinions are still prevalent among many learned as well as 
ignorant men. To be sure, had not Columbus made use 
of the accumulated means, ideas and aspirations to un- 
dertake the discovery of America, some other sailor 
would have done it; the talent and courage requisite 
for such a voyage are by no means rare among sailors 
generally. 

Or as Thomas Buckle says of James Watt, the inventor 
of the steam-engine : " He would have surely not 
achieved what he has, without his predecessors." This 
may be applied to all men who distinguished themselves 
and achieved great successes as well as to common peo- 
ple. 

It is, dear friends, the supreme duty of science to re- 
duce the extraordinary, i. e., which appears to the general 
superstition as extraordinary, to the level of the ordi- 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 105 

nary, the usual, the natural or normal. The saints and 
the sanctuaries, the religious and the worldly ones, must 
disappear in order that the only eternal and true sanctu- 
ary : humanity or mankind, may live. To make brother- 
hood a reality ; to make it impossible to despise any one, 
it is necessary to cease to humbly look up to any one. 
The social-democrat should not stare at the chief of a 
republic as the peasant does at the priest; he should not 
regard him as a biped God, as the chosen supreme master. 
We are all born chiefs, while the elected chief is simply 
the temporary administrator of the ordinary state of 
affairs, the business manager the like of whom there are 
hundreds among the people. The tribe of David should 
intermingle with the tribe of Melchizedek and form one 
tribe of citizens with equal rights. 

Let us now return to the doctrine of our social-demo- 
cratic church, the foundation-stone of which is the ac- 
cumulated material and mental wealth, and which teaches 
us to believe that that heavy stone had been hewn and 
brought to light neither entirely without nor altogether by 
the effort of certain select individuals and noble fam- 
ilies, but by the exceedingly hard labor, material and 
mental, of the whole society. Only knaves and fools call 
this a system, of crude levelling-up. Those, however, 
who have studied our church- fathers know that our social 
hierarchy, the difference between the great and the small, 
the virtuous and the wicked, the noble and the common, 
the learned and the untaught, have only been established 
in order to endow the few with privileges and to keep 
the masses in servitude. No, fellow-citizens ! the equal- 
ity of social-democracy is by no means a fantastic equal- 
ity. It does not exclude diversity. Nature has given 
us the same desire to satisfy our hunger, to clothe our 
body and to develop our capacities. Men have always 



106 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

and everywhere the same imperious instinct of self-pres- 
ervation and the same desire to live in enjoyable activity, 
without misery or servitude. The equality in the desire 
does not interfere with the natural diversity, with the 
peculiar talents and proclivities given to each of us. 
Just as in nature as a matter of fact equality and diver- 
sity intermingle and form one united whole, so will the 
social order of the future make all men equal in rank and 
value, by giving them the equal right to the enjoyment 
of their individual life, without obliterating the diversity 
which requires of every one to act according to his gifts. 
A new era has dawned upon mankind. It bids us ap- 
proach its message in the light of new ideas and a new 
understanding. 

The first and foremost thing in this respect is to revise 
our present notion of the supreme being and our idea of 
perfection. Until now we have been taught to regard 
and to revere the sublime, the supreme, the divine and 
the perfect as a single thing or being. Here the bar- 
barians found it in a tree, there in a golden calf, then in 
the thunder and lightning as the fierce justice, finally the 
Christians deified the spirit of love. Why was the spirit 
of love so imperfect? Because he lacked the antithesis, 
the flesh and bone. We shall give him reality when we 
search for the perfect, the great and sublime not in one 
single thing, nor in one single quality, nor in one particu- 
lar personality, but in the communion and intimate con- 
nection of all men and things. Various peoples and 
various ages idolized the most diverse things as the su- 
preme perfection. Here it was bodily strength and mar- 
tial prowess, there it was Samaritan pity and spiritual 
power. But none of these single things has stood the 
test of time. The deified qualities have proved to be as 
transient as the gods themselves, and as the peoples who 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 107 

have for a long time been looking for the true God, until 
the truth has forced itself to the front that men as well as 
things are all equally sublime, equally perfect and divine. 
I hear already the shrill voice of the heretics, i. e., of the 
adversaries of our gospel, charging us with iniquitous 
blasphemy. Our respectable citizens cannot perceive a 
state of things without masters and servants, without 
nobles and commoners, without virtuous and wicked. 
They think it quite strange to ascribe the same value to 
the crooked as to the straight, to the donkey as to the 
miller. Verily, I tell you, the more reasonable the miller 
the more will he value his donkey. Both of them are in 
this point equal, that they serve each other, and that 
either of them is, in the right time and the right place, 
a valuable part of a united whole. Only that and no 
more is the meaning of the social-democratic doctrine of 
equality. The privileged divinity of the individual must 
be abolished if the general deviltry should once for all 
be done away with. Nothing shall be rejected as im- 
pure, everything shall be worthy of a place in the taber- 
nacle, that it may be able, in its time and station, to 
serve for the best of all. Humanity, knowing how to 
live in mutual service and to supplement one another 
with the things of this world, is the bodily representation 
of the supreme being and of divine perfection. 

The social-democratic equality, my friends, is there- 
fore something quite different from the insipid political 
equality to which the liberal parties want to treat the 
people. They want political equality, that we may help 
them to establish a state of things in which they could 
use us unreservedly for the preservation and augmenta- 
tion of their wealth, while the aim and end of our equal- 
ity is to restore the wealth to those who in the course of 
centuries created it by hard, ceaseless toil, namely, to the 



108 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

people. The wealth of to-day is the instrument of future 
labor. In the present it serves private ends, in the future 
it shall serve social ends. The restoration of that in- 
strument to the people shall not take the form of a divi- 
sion. It shall not be divided up in the manner which 
obtains to-day, where some get more than their due, 
while some get nothing at all and are consequently 
forced into the servitude of the rich; nor shall it be 
divided up in equal but petty shares so that each individ- 
ual is to start out on his own hook on a life of drudgery, 
or is to run the risk of being cheated out of his heritage 
by the jugglery of the cunning. No, that instrument 
shall not be subjected to any partition, but it shall be 
handled with organized skill by co-operative labor; the 
product only shall be divided and consumed. That is 
the communism of social-democracy. 

While Nature ruled with the overpowering force of 
fate or of a god, and cowed humanity into poverty, it 
might have been useful to entrust certain individuals or 
certain classes with the power of government that they 
might serve as guides for the people. The ancient, the 
feudal and to-day's bourgeois order of slavery are pro- 
gressive steps to the organization of labor. Now, how- 
ever, the time is approaching which calls upon us to take 
a much farther step than the liberal and democratic 
parties are dreaming of. By the productivity of labor 
the people have arrived at the point where they want that 
all class-domination shall cease. They feel themselves 
competent to continue the economic development without 
the help of privileged leaders. The liberty, with which the 
bourgoisie goads the people into a struggle against 
the landed interests or against bureaucracy; the equality 
and fraternity, which priestcraft promises us with the 
purpose of binding us to it with ropes of superstition, 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 109 

turns into the real liberty, equality and fraternity of so- 
cial-democracy. 

If religion consists in the belief in supernatural beings 
and forces, in the belief in gods and spirits, then social- 
democracy is without religion. In its place we put the 
consciousness of the insufficiency of the individual, who 
needs therefore to his completion and perfection the co- 
operation of the whole, and consequently acknowledges 
his submission to the whole. Civilized human society 
is the supreme being in which we believe; on its trans- 
formation to socialism we build our hope. Such a hu- 
manity w r ill make love a reality, of which the religious 
enthusiasts have only been dreaming. The deluded and 
the obdurate, who cannot believe in the social-democratic 
development of society, may feel the necessity of trans- 
ferring their hope from this earth to a Hereafter. Not 
so the social-democrat. In order to really participate in 
the consolation which the believer finds in the idea of a 
heavenly father who protects and defends his children, 
we are striving for a society which shall assist the help- 
less individual in all his needs. We call upon society — 
and by virtue of its accumulated wealth we are entitled 
to call upon society — that it shall vouchsafe to each of 
its members not only work, but also daily bread, and that 
it shall feed the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the 
sick, in short, it shall carry out the work of love and 
mercy. We appeal to society, not only to call itself hu- 
man but to be human. In the place of religion, social- 
democracy puts humanity, which shall no more rest on 
the basis of an ethical commandment, but on the recog- 
nition that its savior can only be found in co-operative, 
brotherly work: in economic communism. The original 
sin, from which mankind has been suffering, is selfish- 
ness. Moses and the prophets, all religious founders 



110 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

and legislators together have been unable to extirpate it. 
" The sin dwelleth in the flesh as the nail in the wall." 
No preaching or teaching and commanding could eradi- 
cate it, for the whole constitution of our present society 
hinges upon that nail. Bourgeois society rests on the 
^elfish distinction of mine and thine, rests on social war, 
on competition, on the cunning devices of getting the 
best of each other. 

In conclusion let me point out the moral : it demands — 
and its whole being depends on this demand — that we 
reconcile the antithesis between love and selfishness ; that 
we constitute our society on this reconciliation ; that men 
shall join hands and with united strength and labor force 
Nature to yield us our daily bread in plenty. 

III. 
Friends: 

Before we proceed to deal with the meaning of the 
moral, drawn from our previous remarks, I should like 
to call your attention to the essential characteristics, to 
the great and general outlines of religion. I shall not 
speak of any special denomination: neither of the Chris- 
tian, Jewish, Mohammedan or pagan beliefs, but of idol- 
atry in general. 

We have found that religion and social-democracy 
have this in common, that they both strive for salvation. 
Yet, social-democracy is in this respect more advanced 
that it does not look for salvation in the realm of spirit, 
but in the world of material realities, taking human spirit 
only as its guide. The need for salvation, the misery of 
the primitive man is the psychological germ out of which 
religion evolved. This perplexity and helplessness in 
the midst of a world of adversities causes man to look 
for omnipotence and perfection in some other quarters, 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY III 

and suggested to him the worship of animals, stars, trees, 
lightning, winds, certain heroic personalities, etc. But 
eventually in the long run experience inevitably taught 
him that those things are themselves powerless. Man 
took a step further and looked for the supreme being no 
more in near-by and tangible things, but in a spirit reign- 
ing in the clouds. Removed from experience as the new 
godhead was, it became more difficult to get some reliable 
information about it. Yet modern science, which suc- 
ceeded in fathoming many a mystery, penetrated also to 
the bottom of the secret of religion. 

The " wealthy and cultured," whose care for science 
extends but so far as it helps them to accumulate treasure 
and to preserve their privileges, are in fact the mean 
materialists to whom nothing is of more serious concern 
than the selfish cultivation of the body. It is these peo- 
ple who are fain to declare that we must not discuss re- 
ligion, as nothing could be known about it. Against all 
such assertions I may assure you, friends, that religion, 
despite its obscurity and lofty mysteriousness, did not 
escape the piercing eye of science, which penetrated into 
its most remote and darkest corners. Just as we know 
as a certainty that two and two equals four, or that there 
are no two mountains without a valley, on earth or in 
heaven or anywhere else, so do we know what and who 
religion and God are, where they begin and end, where 
they come from and how they dissolve. 

The ruling classes and their conscious or unconscious 
flunkeys have an interest to contend against the austerity 
of religion, as it interferes with their worldly enjoyments. 
For those who really believe and trust in an eternal 
treasure which is eaten neither by rust nor by moths, 
lose their appetite for the evanescent joys of the world. 
Indeed, religious as well as political liberalism is closely 



112 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

connected with property and with the mode of business 
prevailing to-day. The aristocratic families of the past 
were the friends and followers of the monks, for both 
had their kitchen and cellar supplied by socage and tithes. 
The great houses of the present, which " earn " their 
sumptuous living by profit-making of! the labor of others, 
and this on so liberal, i. e., plentiful, a scale, are more 
than alienated from the orthodox preacher of Christian 
discipline and sobriety; their attitude towards him is full 
of antipathy. Yet it would be a mistake to assume that 
liberalism is serious in its unbelief. They can't be seri- 
ous. Their privileged social position condemns the 
" wealthy and cultured " to that nauseous luke-warmness, 
to that indifferentism which is neither cold nor warm. 
Their religious freemasonry, their protests against super- 
stition — by the way, all belief is superstition — cannot 
be serious, for the religious discipline is one of the main- 
stays of class-rule. Though they have lost all belief in 
God they never tire of reminding us of his command- 
ments : " Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's 
. . . Be subject to principalities and powers, obey 
magistrates . . . Pray and work . . . Bear the 
cross in all humility and patience . . ." While they 
are fiercely striving to climb up the ladder of might and 
wealth they actually delude us, and perhaps also them- 
selves, into believing that they trust in God, who is sup- 
posed to humble the proud and to exalt the humble. The 
liberal bunglers are easily to be recognized as religious 
hypocrites. The great captains of industry, with their 
liveried and titled flunkeys as professors, justices, law- 
yers, etc., are passionately devoted to freedom of trade 
and competition as well as to freedom of religion. 
Every man shall be free to believe as his conscience dic- 
tates. But woe to those who try to live up to such 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY H3 

maxims and free themselves of all religion! You may 
belong to a nonconformist congregation or to an unde- 
nominational school. But to have no religion at all, or 
to belong to a secular school — why, that's positively 
disgraceful ! That's past all bearing ! Such things must 
be put a stop to! If the people do no more believe in 
anything, who will sanctify our property and supply the 
dear fatherland with food for guns or cannon? 

The small craftsman who feels and sees that the indus- 
trial revolution is undoing him, does not know and does 
not want to know of the inventions and discoveries of 
science. This is quite the case with our " wealthy and 
cultured " in matters of religion. They are used to say : 
If there is no positive proof for the truths of religion, 
there is still less any proof against religion. Because 
their interests are endangered by such knowledge, they 
refuse to admit that more than half a century ago Feuer- 
bach particularly had brought the conclusive and irre- 
futable proof that all religion is simply a substitute for 
human ignorance. 

The human race has this peculiar distinction, that at 
different times and places it values different things and 
qualities as the highest beyond all measure ; — that, unlike 
the apes which but imitate what was shown them, hu- 
manity revolutionizes its highest standards, in short, it 
makes history. Of course, not that history as taught in 
our schools, which is simply a miserable index of the 
births and deaths of princes; an enumeration of wars, 
battles and treaties, while its real import consists in the 
great and solemn evidence that mankind, its generations 
and peoples, constitutes a living and continually develop- 
ing organism, each part of which serves the whole. The 
aim or postulate of this development is to subdue all 
existing matter and forces to human needs, to cultivate 



114 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

nature, and to bring system into the world with the help 
of our mind. This process is going on slowly, by fits 
and starts. Those who by the study of nature and by 
the insight into its boundless possibilities attained to a 
wise humility, recognize without hesitation that the his- 
toric progress, though its aim is to make human con- 
sciousness the lord of the world, is still far from being a 
matter of consciousness. It is much more the instinct, 
the nature of matter, which impels its continual develop- 
ment, through the various geological periods to the for- 
mation of life, which began with the most primitive life- 
cells and developed to higher forms with plants and 
animals by variation and natural selection, until its high- 
est product, man gifted with reason, was brought forth. 
The end and aim of the evolutionary process is to com- 
prehend the manifold phenomena of nature and history 
in order to enable man to consider and to use the human 
race, its ethnological and political organizations and all 
existing mental and material' energies as an organic 
whole. In the course of his development man passion- 
ately idolized anything that happened to range high in 
his estimation, be it an animal, a plant, a star, a human 
being or a law. God - - the essence of religion — ap- 
pears thus as a changeable and temporary, and not as a 
permanent and eternal, character. The divine has 
changed so often that its evanescence became manifest to 
the scientific mind. Science has therefore formulated the 
proposition : That which religion values beyond measure 
is in historic reality but temporarily and locally valuable. 
Religious people are wont to assert that all races, 
savage or civilized, have some sort of religion and believe 
in God. From which they infer that religion is inherent 
in man and needs, therefore, no further demonstration. 
That assertion is, however, only in so far true as oeople 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 11$ 

without experience are credulous, and aH the more so, 
the less experience and culture they possess. Nowadays 
it is but peasants and women that are the true believers. 
Those who have eyes to see perceive that there is not one, 
but many religions, and not one God, but many Gods. 
As man attains to the understanding of the world only by 
degrees, he idolizes many things, to-day the sun, to- 
morrow the moon, one time the dog, as the Persians, at 
another time the cat, as the Egyptians, until he finally 
gains the social-democratic truth that nothing and every- 
thing is divine, nothing and everything does invaluable 
services. What the heathen valued in their gods, in Bac- 
chus — wine, in Venus — love, etc. ; what the Israelites 
valued in Jahve — the punishing, reproving and law- 
making; what the Christians worship in their God — the 
incarnation, suffering and dying for others, boundless 
love and mercy, contempt for worldly matters, abstemi- 
ousness, celibacy, etc. — all this, my friends, is to be val- 
ued temporarily and locally, but never to be idolized. 
Not the objects of religion are reprehensible, but the 
essence of religion, which is boundless and inordinate in 
its veneration. 

The essence of religion consists in this, that certain 
phenomena of nature and history, which, according to 
time and circumstances, acquired an unusual importance, 
have been personified and put on so high a pinnacle that 
they appear to be independent of time and space. 

The religious truth is but a natural truth standing on 
its head. Not God created man, but always and every- 
where man created God in his own image. If some out- 
of-the-way people, possessed of wisdom, happen to get 
the sacred books of our churches, they will learn nothing 
about God and heaven, but a good deal about the civiliza- 
tion of men who wrote and esteemed those things. How 



Il6 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

near our time is to giving up all religion, is evident from 
the vague and confused ideas now circulating about God 
and his attributes. While man comes to the knowledge 
of the existence of all other things because he had known 
before how and what they are, he wants to be convinced 
of the existence of God before knowing anything in par- 
ticular about his nature, whether he is of human or in- 
human form, small or large, black- or blue-eyed, male 
or female. The theologians, being themselves in the 
dark, label such questions materialistic and improper. 
But the more advanced thinkers know already that the 
very few things their colleagues assume to know about 
God when they qualify him as just, good, wise, almighty, 
etc. — that all those qualities are not religious, but pro- 
fane and earthly qualities, which we may find here on 
earth without taking the trouble of going up to heaven. 
Such qualifications are called by the scholars " anthropo- 
morphistic," that is, where man over-estimates justice, 
he describes a just God, and where he has a liking for 
human flesh, he treats his God therewith. The advanced 
theologians are well aware of that and decline to give any 
description of their objects of worship. But is it not 
senseless to assert the existence of something and at the 
same time to confess complete ignorance of how, where 
and what its nature is? The more the idea of God re- 
cedes into the past the more palpable it is ; in olden times 
man knew everything about his God; the more modern 
the form of religion has become, the more confused and 
hazy are our religious ideas. The truth is that the his- 
toric development of religion tends to its gradual disso- 
lution. 

A little while ago I characterized religion as the sub- 
stitute of human ignorance, that is, it fills up the gaps 
of knowledge. Where the gaps are wide, there the scope 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 117 

of religion is wide. The whole life of barbarian tribes, 
their work and their rest, their social customs and laws 
are under the strict control of God. The God of Abra- 
ham, Isaac and Jacob cares about the most insignificant 
details ; he supervises the cleanliness of his people ; he 
prescribes how to hitch their animals to the carriage, in 
short, there is nothing left to a true Israelite which is not 
regulated by divine command. The same may be said 
of all Asiatic religions. On the other hand, the civilized 
nations of to-day leave to God those things only whose 
laws have not yet been discovered, as the making of the 
weather, the healing of malignant diseases, etc. To an 
enlightened liberal the blessed name of the Lord is in 
reality no more than the A, the beginning of the alphabet 
of his conception of the world. Once he passes beyond 
the beginning, he allows the world to take its natural 
course. To this un-Christian Christian everything in the 
world is natural except the beginning, which is unnatural 
and divine. It is this consideration which stands in the 
way of his giving up the belief in the existence of God, 
which has also the advantage of keeping the lower orders, 
the " illiterate," in check. The only link which connects 
this sham-religion of the Progressive-Liberal with the 
Catechism is the so-called " moral world." But inasmuch 
as he begins dimly to perceive that morality, too, has a 
worldly basis, his association of ideas becomes dim and 
shadowy. As soon as we are conscious of the fact that 
the ethical had not its roots in the divine will, but, on the 
contrary, that which, for social reasons, had become eth- 
ical receives subsequently divine sanction; — as soon as 
we recognize that ethics was antecedent to the " Eternal," 
the Church loses the ground from under its feet. If we 
compare the wide scope of religious life of the pagan 
past, when the trees and bushes, the hills and waters 



Il8 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

teemed with gods and goddesses; — if we compare the 
intense faith of early Christianity with its manifold saints 
and miracles ; — if we compare all that with the position 
of to-day, when religion is pushed into the background 
by so many other considerations, then, I think, no im- 
partial observer will be able to disagree with our propo- 
sition, that the progress or development of religion con- 
sists in its gradual dissolution. No doubt, this is the 
usual course of things in the world. With the first day 
of his life the new-born begins his pilgrimage towards 
the grave. And stronger words than those I could not 
conscientiously utter against religion. It is not an eter- 
nal or heavenly affair, but an earthly and temporal one. 

The last and strongest religious argument, brought 
forward by rather unprejudiced minds, is the undeniable 
fitness of things in nature or in the universe. Who 
could deny the wonderful order of the universe, its har- 
mony, organization and system? Apart from the num- 
berless illustrations usually brought in favor of that argu- 
ment, apart from the green, blue and speckled cuckoo's 
eggs, which, according to color and volume, always fit in 
with the bird's eggs to which they are added, we find in 
every step the proofs of a universal intelligence which 
uses everything that is living and existing as a part, as a 
suitable organic part of the whole. To recognize the 
evolution or the gradual organization, not only of nature 
but also of human society, is the special task of social-dem- 
ocrats. Their superior understanding consists just in 
this, that they regard all phenomena of nature and human 
history as being parts of the whole that are involved in 
the process of evolution, and even such things as religion, 
morality and property, which are usually looked upon 
as constant and eternal; there is no sacred exception to 
this rule. And how could they fail to recognize that 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY II9 

there is in this whole something of a higher life to which 
the individual parts are subordinated? But when recog- 
nizing this, there is no necessity of going back to religion 
and mysticism. Experience has so much sharpened our 
wits that we spotted the rocks on which human reason, 
in its efforts to get at the truth, has hitherto often suf- 
fered shipwreck. The learned marked them with the 
ponderous name: anthropomorphism. It is the manner 
of the unsophisticated, which is so difficult to get rid of, 
to measure and to interpret the external world by the 
gauge of their own individual life. Because man pur- 
sues his aims deliberately and consciously he substitutes 
a being in his own image, gifted with deliberative power 
and consciousness, as the architect of the system of na- 
ture. And even among intelligent people whose sense of 
criticism is so far developed as to shake all belief in a 
personal God, we find that they cannot do away with all 
philosophic mysticism; they take refuge either in a phi- 
losophy of the unconscious, which attributes will and con- 
ception to unconscious things, or to spiritualism and 
theosophy. 

It cannot however be denied that there is in dead mat- 
ter a living impluse towards a higher form of organiza- 
tion, and that, consequently, the material world is not 
dead, but living. Yet, it is necessary to keep in mind 
that we can only speak of its will and purpose in a rel- 
ative and comparative sense. For the manifestation of 
the universal intelligence is but gradual. The higher the 
organization of matter the clearer the manifestation of 
the intelligence. We see it in the animal instinct in a 
limited degree of clearness and it attains to a pure ex- 
pression in the cerebral function of man, i. e., in our 
consciousness. To attribute purpose, will and conception 
to low-organized matter is therefore as wrong as to call 



120 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

twilight day because of the limited degree of light the 
former possesses. And if I ventured a little while ago 
to make use of those terms it was but with the intention 
to discredit them and to show their relative meaning. 
To be sure, there is reason in the natural things. But 
for this it was possible for the homo sapiens to appear 
without divine assistance on the stage of history. Those 
who recognize reason, the source of all system and of all 
fitness of things, as a product of nature, cannot fail to 
admit the suitability inherent in nature. Yet, the spirit 
of man is the only spirit. This name cannot be given to 
the reason which we find in the orderly revolutions of the 
solar systems, or in the cuckoo's eggs, or in the construc- 
tion of the bee's cell, or in the working of the ants, or in 
the head of apes, but solely to its highest manifestation, 
to the consciousness, to the cerebral function of man. 

Our spirit is the highest spiritual being. But, my 
pious friends, that is, my attentive friends, we must not 
put it on the high pinnacle of a religious godhead. High 
and low means in our materialistic philosophy as much as 
more or less organized. The less autonomous the parts 
of a thing are, the more they function as organs, the 
more interdependent and closely connected they are, the 
more numerous and varied their natural communications 
and services, the higher is the thing in the hierarchy of 
nature. Our consciousness is the universal center, the 
universal means of communication-. But it does not ex- 
ist by itself, isolated in aristocratic aloofness like our 
Lord God, but it is in its good democratic way only a 
point of contact, a connection with all other things. 
Even before natural science mastered the art of differ- 
entiation and unification, the logic or the science of mind 
had discovered that there is but one species, namely, 
worldly things, while everything else is but a variety. 






THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 121 

The conscious and unconscious, the plants and animals, 
the good and bad, all diversity, all antagonisms of the 
world must be considered as diverse forms of one and 
the same being, which gradually merge into each other, 
carrying on a perpetual struggle for existence, and re- 
newing and perfecting themselves through natural selec- 
tion. Out of chaos arose cosmos, which gradually 
evolved reason-gifted man, whose pleasant duty it is to 
further the progress of our world, to remove its imper- 
fections. His task can be best effected by studying and 
organizing its forces. Indeed, man has always been 
working at his task, but until now in an unconscious 
manner: when his intellectual and civilizing efforts had 
sufficiently accumulated to form a great generalization 
and a new social stage he rested for a time; those were 
epoch-making instances which found their visible ex- 
pression in a new religious conception: the animal-wor- 
ship of oriental nations, the Law of Israel, the Humanity 
of Christ, etc. But where man becomes conscious of his 
task, where he recognizes in himself the absolute organ- 
izer, there the place of the religious conception is taken 
by the anti-religious social-democracy. 

IV.— i. 

It is in reality a priestly nuisance to address my com- 
rades from the height of the pulpit. Pulpit, Christianity 
and religion have often been made to serve so many 
crooked purposes that it is very unpleasant for an up- 
right man to come in close touch with them. Yet, we 
must approach them closely in order to do away with 
those things altogether. If you want to put a brawler 
out of the temple you must first embrace him, — that's 
one of the sensible contradictions of life. 



122 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

It is not an unusual phenomenon in history to see how 
one thing is being transformed into another thing with 
the name remaining the same. To the inexperienced the 
changed new thing is easily represented as the familiar old 
one. Such is the case with pulpit, Christianity and re- 
ligion. This is a conservative trick which causes much 
confusion in the minds of the people. Even among our 
comrades there are some who are thus caught. They 
say: Christ was the first socialist. Yet, Socialism and 
Christianity differ from each other as the day does from 
the night. To be sure, there are points of resemblance be- 
tween them. But show me the thing to which no analogy 
could be found ! What does totally differ ? Day and night 
have this in common, that they are both portions of time. 
The devil and the archangel are both of the same nature, 
though one be black- and the other white-skinned, inas- 
much as both of them do claim some kind of a skin. It 
is the fundamental faculty of our mind to bring all di- 
versity under one general heading. Though Christianity 
and Socialism may have some points in common, it is 
none the less true that whoever mistakes Christ for a 
socialist is surely a dangerous muddlehead. In fact, our 
knowledge is one-sided when based only on what phe- 
nomena have in common. We must look also for their 
differentiation. Not what the Socialist has in common 
with the Christian, but what distinguishes and differ- 
entiates him from the Christian shall be the subject of 
our consideration. 

Christianity was recently qualified as the religion of 
servility. This seems to me a very apt qualification. 

Indeed, all religion is servile, but Christianity is the 
most servile of the servile. Let us take the next best 
Christian saying we meet with on the road. On my 
way there stands a cross with inscription : " Mercy, gra- 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 1 23 

cious Jesus ! Holy Maria, pray for us." Here we have 
the inordinate humility of Christianity in all its wretched- 
ness. For those who build all their hope on mercy are 
wretched creatures, indeed. Those who start out in life 
with the belief in an Almighty God, and prostrate them- 
selves before the destinies and forces of nature, and in 
their piteous feeling of impotency moan for mercy, are 
anything but efficient members of modern society. When 
we see that modern Christians act differently, that they 
brave the storm and courageously face danger, that they 
actively strive to remove calamity, it is only because of 
their defection from Christianity. Though they continue 
to keep their name, their song-books and their anxieties, 
they are in their doings and dealings perfect anti-Christs. 
We non-religious social-democrats must be fully con- 
scious of this position. We want to be consciously and 
deliberately, in theory and practice, the energetic oppo- 
nents of that sheepish and godly humility. 

Rooted in the flesh like an old Adam is that disastrous 
human disposition to perpetuate a thing which was only 
meant to serve certain conditions. Inertia and selfish- 
ness are joined together to hush up, to deny or to con- 
ciliate the contradiction between Christian contempt of 
worldly life and the joyful, strenuous activity which dis- 
tinguishes the present generation. Christianity wants 
resignation, while modern life wants us to work with all 
our might for the satisfaction of our material needs. 
Confidence in God is the foremost Christian virtue, while 
self-confidence, the exact opposite, is necessary to achieve 
success. Those who dare to put into the mouth of Chris- 
tianity the maxim : " Trust in God, but thou shalt not 
hide thy talents," by which they mean to convey that 
work was not an un-Christian thing, but, on the contrary, 
a Christian command, are preposterous sophists. Wot k 



124 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

in the Christian sense differs wholly from modern and 
real work. The Christian works for Heaven, crucifies 
his flesh and subdues his passion. And when he works 
for his daily bread, then it must only be for such an 
unkeep as to prolong his tribulations in this valley of 
tears in order to be worthy of true eternal life. " He that 
loveth his life shall lose it ; and he that hateth his life in 
this world shall keep it unto life eternal " (St. John, 12, 
25). Heavenly eternity is the aim of the Christian; the 
earthly world is the aim of sensible men. 

Herr Daniel Schenkel, D.D., of Heidelberg, is indig- 
nant at the assertion that the essence of Christianity is 
the negation of this world. " Is it true," he exclaims, 
" that Christianity does not regard this world as a worthy 
place, nay, not even as a possible place for religion — 
this world of which the Gospel says : So did God love 
His world that He sent His only begotten Son unto it. 
Did the primitive Christians renounce the world? 
Didn't they rather expect Christ to appear again on earth 
and to substitute a new order of things for the old, rotten 
one ? " Thus speaks a sophistical reasoner who cares 
very little for consistent reasoning, but a good deal for 
a compromise between his half-hearted rationalism and 
the Christian religion. Or does he feel the need of de- 
luding others, if not himself, too? Does he not know 
that Christianity has two worlds like the Prussians, one 
that is white and the other black? The beautiful world 
of reality the Christian has painted black. Its glories 
are but temptations of the devil; its labor a curse; its 
love a sinful lust ; the flesh a weariness to the spirit ; the 
body a wretched carcass. As the enchanted prince 
dwells in a wild beast so does the white world of Chris- 
tian imagination live in this black reality. To save us 
from this world God has sent His Son, who leads us into 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 125 

the heavenly world of Christianity. It consists of spirit- 
ual matter, which is just as possible as iron wood-blocks. 
Its men and women are sexless ; its bodies have no grav- 
ity ; its work is painless. To be sure, the primitive Chris- 
tians did have the desire to renounce the world. They 
expected the reappearance of Jesus at any moment ; they 
expected the destruction of the world and the crack of 
doom. " My kingdom is not of this world." 

However, the fantastic salvation of Christianity, 
which aims at removing the toils of the world, not by 
energetic work, but by believing and trusting, could 
not possibly suppress forever the sensible desire for the 
enjoyment of material life. The heretics, reformers, 
Protestants, old-Catholics, Unitarians and high critics 
have all of them contributed to the victory of the black- 
ened and libelled truth over the whitewashed lie of re- 
ligious imagination. Insofar we Socialists are at one 
with the Progressives. But we protest against this cow- 
ardice in clinging to the old name and in trying to pass 
off their defection from faith for a restoration of true 
Christianity. It is necessary to discredit the name in 
order to do away with the thing itself. 

The religion of the Capitalists is as equivocal and con- 
tradictory as their political economy, liberty, equality and 
fraternity. The farce of the renunciation of the world, 
played by the fat monk, is being continued by the well- 
fed bourgeois. And the most ludicrous part of it is that 
the Progressive falls a long way behind the monk, who 
at least was conscious of the austere character of religion. 
The lukewarm and insipid Christianity of the modern 
humbugs claims to be the only genuine article. The old 
leaders of Christianity, the Saints of the Calendar, man- 
ifested a real contempt for the world and its pleasures; 
they loved the life of a hermit, wore the hair shirt, morti- 



126 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

fied their body and fed themselves on roots and herbs. 
Their life bore evidence of their doctrine : " God is a 
spirit." Our modern crusaders turn to another page 
where it is written : " He was made flesh and dwelled 
among us." No doubt, the germ of equivocation and 
senseless contradiction lay from the beginning in the 
Christian doctrines. The apostles and church fathers 
made sometimes concessions to the public. They taught 
how to drive out lust by marriage, and Satan by Beelze- 
bub. From some passages it might appear that praying 
and fasting were the highest Christian duties, while from 
other passages the opposite conclusion might be drawn, 
that the Lord finds no pleasure in sacrifice. Christianity, 
not being above nature, cannot dispense with the joy of 
life altogether, and must end by compromising and trim- 
ming. The clear-sighted social-democrat will not be de- 
tained by the trees from recognizing the forest. The 
essence of Christianity is abstemiousness in this world 
and sweet peas in Heaven. 

A doctrine which swayed nations and continents for 
centuries has surely its historic significance. But this 
granted, we must reject its claim to eternal domination. 
The good which Christianity contains, as, for instance, 
mortifying the flesh as a means against non-married lust, 
or brotherhood of man against national jealousies, is 
readily accepted by social-democracy. We condemn all 
jingoism which, however, the Christian church as a rule 
fosters. Yet we cannot regard that truth as divine and 
holy. 

With that difference between religious and secular 
truth we arrive at the point which essentially distin- 
guishes the Socialist from the Christian. To its elucida- 
tion I should like to ask you, my friends, to give me your 
special attention for a while. 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 12TJ 

Truth is truth, undoubtedly ! But in its religious form 
it is one-sided, insensate and intolerant. Take for in- 
stance the principle of brotherhood of man. It is an 
eternal truth, i. e., it is a human need that men shall live 
together. Sociability is in their nature, they must love 
one another; and where they fail to recognize it they 
suffer in their own well-being and happiness. Where, 
however, the religious believer has taken up that prin- 
ciple, where the Christian commands : Love thy neighbor 
as thyself, there he goes at it with such a fierceness that 
he knocks all rime and reason out of it. When he be 
smitten on the right cheek he is to offer the Jeft one, too. 
When he preaches love he excludes hatred. On the other 
hand, Socialism does not only preach love of humanity, 
but is based on it. The anti-religious, reasonable love of 
humanity knows how to limit itself; it does not over- 
shoot the mark or exclude its antithesis : the hatred, but 
includes it as a holy because necessary means for tem- 
porary use. We, too, desire to love the enemy and to do 
good to him who hates us — but not ere we have effected 
his unconditional surrender. Meanwhile we sing with 
Herwegh : 

Die Liebe kann erlosen nicht, 

Die Liebe nicht erretten, 
Halt du, O Hass, dein jungst Gericht, 

Brich du, O Hass, die Ketten. 

Bis unsre Hand in Asche stiebt, 
Soil sie vom Schwert nicht lassen, 

Wir haben lang genug geliebt 
Und wollen endlich hassen. 

(Love cannot save, Love cannot redeem, 
Arise thou, O Hate, and break our chains. 
Until our hand withers we shall not relinquish the sword, 
We've loved long enough, let us now hate.) 



128 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 



IV.— 2. 



The question we are dealing with concerns the differ- 
ence between religious and profane truth. That the Jew 
shall not run about unwashed, Moses prescribed cleanli- 
ness as a law. Cleanliness is a necessary requirement; 
it is a truism. In its religious form however it is of a 
solemn immobility, fixed to time, place and number; it 
prescribes when, in what manner and how often one must 
wash. The religious truth is a binding prescription; 
secular science and the free use of water cleanses more 
thoroughly than that prescription. In science the atom 
is as worthy an object as the starry sky. There is no 
fixed gulf in science between worthy and unworthy ob- 
jects, and none in scientific ethics between good and 
evil. All things and qualities are useful and suitable; 
clean and unclean, love and hate, enjoyment and renun- 
ciation — all is relative, more or less, according to time 
and conditions. Scientific freedom, subordinating all 
things and qualities to human ends, is thoroughly anti- 
religious. Religious truth consists just in this, that it 
lifts natural qualities above nature, that it separates them 
from the living stream of human progress and confines 
them in a stagnant pool. 

In qualifying the common and profane truth as " scien- 
tific," I should like to remind you, friends and comrades, 
that the scientific truth is called profane and common. 
It is necessary to bear that in mind, seeing that a scien- 
tific priesthood has arisen which is aiding and abetting 
religious priestcraft. To destroy palpable superstition 
would be an easy matter if dualistic confusion were not 
on the lookout for the gaps of science in order to lay 
there its eggs. Such gaps are to be found especially in 
the field concerning epistemology, the theory of the 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 1 29 

method of cognition. As the Laplander or Firelander is 
terrorized by mighty natural phenomena, so is the pro- 
fessor by the wondrous working of the human mind. 
Enlightened freethinkers, who easily dispense with Chris- 
tianity and religion in general, are still caught in the 
snares and pitfalls of superstition as long as they don't 
clearly distinguish between religious and profane truth, 
and as long as they are not clear about the organ of 
truth or the faculty of knowledge. Having materialized 
everything spiritual, there remained nothing for the pro- 
fessors but to spiritualize their own profession, science. 
They assume academic knowledge to be of a different 
stuff from, say, the knowledge of the peasant, of the 
dyer or of the smith. Scientific agriculture is, however, 
only insofar ahead of usual farming that its rules or its 
knowledge of the so-called natural laws are generaliza- 
tions of a more comprehensive kind. They but differ 
from each other in degree and not in essence, as for in- 
stance a quart of legumes from a quart of peas. There 
must be no groping in the dark about the insipid differ- 
ence between noble science and common understanding, if 
we want to overcome the claims of the aristocracy of in- 
tellect. Our opponents may indignantly protest against 
such crude notions of the democratic levellers who even 
refuse to recognize intellectual distinction. Yet, quite 
as the old struggle against aristocracy was not meant to 
disparage their glorious ancestors, so our shafts are not 
directed against the intellect of the intellectuals. We 
object only to the material privileges which the knightly 
highwaymen and academic scribblers lay claim to. 
Since it is no more possible to brutally coerce the people 
to the production of wealth, the learned satellites of our 
rulers cheat them with the miracles of intellectual labor. 
The distinguished and lucrative position of the professor 



130 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

as well as the profits of the employer are defended under 
the false pretences that intellectual labor stands far 
higher and is ten times more productive than manual 
labor. Because we social-democrats are treating such 
presumptions with contempt, we are nicknamed " blas- 
phemers of art and science." We have the deepest con- 
tempt for the stilted phraseology of " culture and sci- 
ence " and for the talk of the graduated flunkeys who, 
like the pagan priests with their rudimentary knowledge 
of nature, use their sham idealism to keep the people in 
ignorance. The modern dualistic belief in the world of 
a scientific and of an ethical spirit, which is supposed to 
be superior to the common world and is therefore to 
control it, is nothing more than the rehashed superstition 
of an earthly and heavenly life. Professors who need 
the support of religion transform the Kingdom of God 
to a kingdom of scientific spirit. As Lord God finds his 
antipode in the devil so has the pious professor his antag- 
onist in the materialist. 

The materialistic conception of the world is just as old 
as the religious disbelief. And both have been worked 
up in the nineteenth century from their crude form to 
scientific precision. But our learned academicians fail 
to understand that, because they feel their social position 
endangered by the democratic tendencies inherent in ma- 
terialism. Feuerbach says : " It is the characteristic fea- 
ture of a professor of philosophy not to be a philosopher, 
and conversely, it is the characteristic feature of a philos- 
opher not to be a professor of philosophy." To-day we 
are a step farther. Not only philosophy but science in 
general has left its official mouthpieces behind. Even 
where there are materialistic professors in the profes- 
sional chair, there adheres to them some unscientific re- 
ligious nuisance in the form of an idealistic remnant as 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY I3I 

pieces of egg-shell to the unfledged bird. Furthermore, 
one swallow makes no summer, and the really scientific 
conception of a professor cannot take off the blot which 
sullies his whole class. As long as the middle classes 
and their leaders had to fulfill a civilizing mission, their 
academies were nurseries of learning. Since then, how- 
ever, history has moved forward, and the struggle for a 
higher civilization has been devolved on the working 
class, the nethermost stratum of human society. Despite 
this historic change the old decaying rulers are making 
great efforts to preserve their power and are looking to 
the academic dignitaries for support, thus turning the 
" free scientists " into well-paid attorneys to defend a 
dying cause. 

The socialist demand for a more equitable and popular 
distribution of economic goods can be realized by a de- 
mocracy only, by a government of the people who do not 
tolerate the rule of a clique which, under the pretence of 
intellectual superiority, seeks to appropriate the lion's 
share of the social wealth. In order to keep that pre- 
sumptuous selfishness within reasonable bounds it is nec- 
essary to understand clearly the relation between mind 
and matter. Philosophy is therefore a subject which 
closely concerns the working class. This, of course, does 
by no means imply that every working man should try to 
become acquainted with philosophy and study the relation 
between idea and matter. From the fact that we all eat 
bread does not follow that we must understand milling 
and baking. But just as we need millers and bakers so 
does the working class stand in need of keen scholars 
who can follow up the tortuous ways of the false priests 
and lay bare the inanity of their tricks. Manual laborers 
do not sufficiently appreciate the real value of mental 
labor. Their healthy distrust against the leading scrib- 



132 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

biers of bourgeois society leads them too far. They see 
how much wrong-doing is going on under the cloak of 
intellectual work and are therefore inclined to undervalue 
mental labor and to overestimate manual labor. This 
brutal materialism must be counteracted. Physical 
vigor, bodily superiority was always the prerogative of 
the working classes. But in default of mental training 
they have so far been outwitted. The emancipation of 
the working classes requires that they should lay hold on 
the science of the century. The mere sentiment of indig- 
nation against the unjust conditions under which we 
suffer does not meet the case of freeing the working 
class, superior in numbers and physique as they may be. 
They must have recourse to the armory of intellect. Of 
all its weapons the theory of cognition or the theory of 
science, that is, the understanding of the scientific method 
of thinking, is the universal weapon against religious be- 
lief, driving it out of its last hidden recess. 

The belief in Gods and demi-Gods, in Moses and the 
Prophets, the belief in the Pope, in the Bible, in the 
Kaiser, in his Bismarck and his government, in short, all 
belief in authorities, finds its definite and final reply in 
the science of mind. As long as we have not discovered 
how and where wisdom arises we are easily exposed to 
the danger of being bamboozled. The clear knowledge 
of how thoughts are being produced puts us on a coign 
of vantage which makes us independent of God, books 
and men. In dissolving the dualism of mind and matter, 
the theory of the scientific method of thinking destroys 
the last pillar which supports a society divided into rulers 
and ruled, into oppressors and oppressed. 

I don't think here is the proper place to enter more 
fully into the discussion of the theory of mind. I shall 
confine myself to the statement of some of its most evi- 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 1 33 

dent and irrefutable propositions, in order to be able to 
oppose the presumption of the ruling classes which, by- 
pleading intellectual work, endeavor to extenuate the 
charge of their exploitation of the people. The socialist 
attack on their economic, or class, position fills them with 
fanatic fury. They are therefore unable to bring the nec- 
essary impartiality to bear upon the study of subjects 
which may produce social changes. Mental and social 
science can hardly meet with the sympathy of an audi- 
ence which, through their privileged and propertied posi- 
tion, are interested in clogging the wheel of civilization. 
Such a science appeals all the more to the judicious atti- 
tude of the have-nots, of the disinherited and oppressed. 
Ad rem! Spirit is neither a ghost nor the breath of 
God. Idealists and materialists agree that spirit belongs 
to the category of " worldly things/' dwells in human 
brains, and is nothing else than an abstract expression, 
a collective noun expressive of thoughts which exist 
simultaneously and follow each other in organic order. 
If spirit is understood to be no more than another word 
for our force of thinking, who could then deny the some- 
what paradoxical, yet empirical, proposition that mental 
work is a bodily effort? With this I venture to intro- 
duce you to the rather difficult chapter of contradictions. 
As line and point are but mathematical conceptions, so 
are contradictions no real things, but logical niceties, and 
have only a relative and comparative value. Relatively 
the great is small and the small great. In this sense we 
may say matter and mind, like all opposites, are logically 
but not really in opposition to each other, since all oppo- 
sites are such only in way of comparison. Our body is 
so closely connected with our spirit, that physical labor 
is absolutely impossible without spiritual collaboration. 
Even the simplest work of an unskilled laborer requires 



134 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

the co-operation of mind. Conversely, the belief in 
metaphysics or in disembodied spiritual labor is an ab- 
surdity. Even the purest mental exercise is undoubtedly 
an effort of the body. All human work is both mental 
and physical. From my preceding lectures at least as 
much is evident, that thoughts not only originate from 
the brains and therefore proceed subjectively from mat- 
ter, but that they always and everywhere have some 
palpable thing as their object. Cerebral matter is the 
subject of thought, the infinite material of the world is 
its object. 

The mind as well as the body is eager to produce, to 
bring forth fruit. Therefore intellectual work must be- 
come materialized and bodily work spiritualized. An 
analysis of the product of labor will never indicate how 
much the mind has contributed to it and how much the 
body, for they operate together in close companionship, 
and not in isolation from each other. A certain work 
may be characterized, either as mental or physical, the 
product however, is made both by mind and body. Their 
contribution to the whole cannot be separated. Who 
could indicate in a kitchen-garden what parts of the 
plants are due to the spade, the arm of the gardener, the 
soil, the rain and the manure? It has always seemed 
to me an idle and poor endeavor to divide up the products 
of labor according to the factors which contributed to 
them. It is a perverse bourgeois idea which cannot be 
consummated and leads, moreover, in practice to just 
the opposite result. This idea appears to be the out- 
come of that cardinal perversion which wants to turn 
man into an independent producer who, freed from all 
social trammels, should compete with his fellow individ- 
uals and thus realize the fantastic ideals of personal 
liberty. But you, my friends, know full well, that all 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 1 35 

work in the capitalist world is in reality performed in 
common. The intellect of the journalist works for the 
manufacturers, and the manufacturers produce linen for 
the journalists, police agents, shoe-polishers, etc. One 
for all. Nobody looks for his ultimate object in his 
own product, everybody aims at the products of all which 
are supplied by the world's market and find their reali- 
zation in the form of money. If we judge the perform- 
ance of each member of our society according to the 
money he receives, then the stockholders must have con- 
tributed an enormous amount of social labor. 

The work of the individual and that of the family, 
the work of the factory and that of the whole society, 
is an organism, each part of which contributes to the 
whole. The contribution of each organ cannot be me- 
chanically weighed or measured. The Socialist is quite 
aware that the workers are organs of the work process. 
He has completely given up the insipid idea of individ- 
ualizing and dividing up a communistic product, and 
paying to each according to his deserts. Present society, 
with its misunderstood principle of suum cuique (each 
unto his own) and its grotesque justice, acts as unreason- 
ably as the man who gives his eye an overweening care 
while utterly neglecting his leg. As the engineer is 
more careful about his smallest screws than about his big 
wheel, so do we desire that the product of social labor 
shall be divided according to the social needs, so that the 
strong and the weak, the swift and the clumsy, the 
mental and the physical labor, insofar as they are hu- 
man, shall work and enjoy in human community. 

That object, my comrades, is opposed by religion. 

And not only by the formal, the common religion of 
priestcraft, but also by the most purified and sub- 
lime professional religion of hazy idealists. Since the 



I36 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

publication of the first part of my sermon, I have been 
taken to task by several people that I was carried away 
too far by my criticism. Our friend Schafer of Franc- 
fort thinks that I was condemning Jesus for the mis- 
understanding of his followers. They had made of His 
teachings what the Master had never intended ; we should 
therefore discriminate between the ideal true Christianity 
and the degenerated one. My criticism against the in- 
ordinate Christian humility was not well-founded, for the 
Lord Himself was courageous enough to chase the 
money-lenders out of the temple. 

To that I should like to reply: Christianity aims at 
the divine control of the world. What a vain endeavor ! 
Christianity itself is being controlled against its will and 
desire by the nature of things. " Therefore it is so full 
of compromises," therefore the apostle, with all his de- 
sire for celibacy, must allow marriage, and therefore 
Christian non-resistance, which commands to tender the 
left cheek when the right one was smitten, is swept 
away by the indignation of the smitten. But, you see, 
it is not the consistency, it is, indeed, the inconsistency 
of Christianity, for it lays special stress on the neces- 
sity of absolute resignation, on the patience of the lamb 
carried to the shambles. Such humility has surely its 
limits, but that a revolutionary upheaval was a part of 
the divine mission is beyond doubt quite foreign to the 
spirit of Christianity, though we might find here and 
there an insignificant instance from which the contrary 
might be inferred. Whether Christ really meant or 
wanted such a humbleness, I cannot say. After all, why 
should such a question have any interest for us? Pro- 
fane and true truth is not based upon personalities. It 
is based on external objects ; it is objective. It does not 
lay claim to validity because it originates from a great 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 1 37 

master. The utmost we can say is that the master took 
hold of it because it was valid. And just in this lies 
the mistake and the superstition, of which our friend 
Schafer is guilty and which makes me indignantly knock 
at the pulpit that people are full of hero-worship and 
cannot give up their belief in authority and their idolatry 
of the great spirit. , 

Great men, who carry forward the beacon of knowl- 
edge, surely deserve all honor, but only insofar and as 
long as their teaching is founded on realities. 

V. 

Love for the preceptorial office and for the promi- 
nence of the pulpit as well as the approval of a friendly 
and indulgent audience induce me to continue my ser- 
mons. It is, however, but fair to mention that there are 
a good many among you who blame me for being too 
" scholarly " or not " popular " enough. To that I re- 
ply that only trite sayings and truisms are easily com- 
prehensible. The so-called popular things always move 
in the old ruts, while social-democracy has a new doc- 
trine, based on principles which are generally misunder- 
stood and require a total transformation of our mode of 
thinking, and therefore cannot be comprehended without 
a certain mental effort. 

Religion, my comrades, is primitive philosophy. On 
the other hand, Social-democracy is a still growing 
product of the whole historic past. We are, therefore, 
justified in substituting historically developed, worldly. 
Science for Religion and do not deviate from our subject 
by dwelling on worldly, non-religious, matter in these 
hours of devotion. I called religion philosophy because 
it claims not only to redeem us, with the help of Gods, 



I38 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

and by praying and whining, from the earthly miseries, 
but also to lend a systematic frame to our thinking. 
The universal significance of religion for uncultured 
tribes is founded on the universal need for a systematic 
knowledge of the world. Just as we generally have a 
practical need for the dominion over the things of the 
world, so do we generally have a theoretical need for 
a systematic view of life. We require to see the begin- 
ning and the end of everything. The insipid clamor 
about the universality, eternity and inevitability of relig- 
ion is not without some justification. To flatly deny it 
would be Russian nihilism which was justly expelled from 
the " International.'* * We are far from senseless nega- 
tion. We scorn the " Kulturkampfer," in order to fight 
for real culture. We acknowledge that the need for a 
systematic view of the world is inherent in man who 
always requires a canon for his thoughts and deeds. 
The things which engage his attention, as for instance 
mind and body, the transient and the lasting, time and 
eternity, reality and appearance, ethics, state and society, 
he wants to see in a certain order and logical sequence. 
Man requires to have a reasonable connection of his 
ideas, so that he may bring a reasonable system into 
practical life. We, too, we social-democrats and defend- 
ers of revolutionary movements, feel the same want. 
Servile trimmers and bunglers may' perhaps on that 
ground think us religious. We reject that qualification. 
Not because we refuse to admit that religious and so- 
cial-democratic philosophy have something in common, 
but because we want to emphasize the difference be- 
tween them and to break away not only internally, but 

1 An allusion to the expulsion of Bakounin from the " International " 
in j 872. — Editor. 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY I39 

externally also, in name and deed, in short completely 
from everything which smacks of priestcraft. 

Yet, it is not sufficient to dethrone the fantastic and 
religious system of life; it is necessary to put a new 
system, a rational one, in its stead. And that, my 
friends, only the socialists can accomplish. Or, if the 
doctors of philosophy think this language too presump- 
tuous, I will put it differently, though the meaning re- 
mains the same: our social-democracy is the necessary 
outcome of a non-religious and sober way of thinking. 
It is the outcome of philosophic science. Philosophers 
wrestled with the priests in order to replace a non-civ- 
ilized mode of thinking by a civilized one, to replace 
faith by science. The object is achieved, the victory is 
won. Cannibal religion of primitive ages was softened 
by Christianity, philosophy continued in its civilizing 
mission, and after many untenable and transient sys- 
tems produced the imperishable system of science, the 
system of democratic (dialectic) materialism. 

The Prussian professor Treitschke thinks the self- 
confidence of social-democracy to be a clever trick used 
with the purpose of imposing upon the people. Of 
course, he looks for us behind that hedge where he is 
sheltering himself. The professional sycophants, the 
prostitutes of the pen, having long ago sold their honor, 
are quite unable to grasp either the convincing power 
of truth or the self-confidence inspired by a consistent 
and systematic view of the world. The socialist phil- 
osophy, with which we are dealing, is a closely serried 
and well-knit system. A thorough treatment of it could 
only be carried out from a professional chair specially 
appointed for that purpose. My task is a different one. 
In the first place I want to interest you in the new phil- 
osophy and to stimulate you to further investigation and 



I40 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

thinking for yourselves. I am to-day more of a 
raconteur who does not begin with the beginning nor 
finish with the end, but by a rambling method wants 
to excite the curiosity of his audience. I am giving you 
the outlines and the salient points only, which you 
should fill up and further develop by your own work. 

We call ourselves materialists. Just as religion is a 
generic term for various beliefs, so is materialism a 
general name for various scientific conceptions. Re- 
viewing the world from the lofty standpoint of the re^ 
ligious heaven, everything — even the purest ether — 
appears to be common matter, dirt and clay. All phil- 
osophy, even idealist Platonism, all scientific investiga- 
tion, all positive knowledge is in the distorted eyes of 
religion no more than material aspiration. Indeed, all 
philosophers are materialists in disguise, for all of them 
want real knowledge, knowledge of real truth. Mater- 
ialists in the contemptible sense of the word, who find 
the whole object of life in eating, drinking and in the 
satisfaction of physical wants — simple philistines have 
no room in science, they form no particular school and 
do no theorizing whatever. Philosophic materialists, on 
the other hand, are those thinkers who put the real world 
at the beginning, at the head of their investigation, and 
the idea or spirit as the sequel and outcome, as the 
product, while their opponents follow the opposite 
method : they decree, after the religious method, the rise 
of reality from the logos (God spake and it was), the 
material world from the idea. No doubt, materialism 
suffered heretofore from the lack of sound logical evi- 
dence. But now we social-democrats accept the name, 
with which our opponents think to abuse us, because 
we know that "the stone which the builders refused is 
become the head stone of the corner. ,, We would be 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY I4I 

equally justified to call ourselves idealists, inasmuch as 
our system is based on the final results of philosophy, on 
the scientific investigation of ideas, on the clear insight 
won into the nature of mind. How little our opponents 
are capable of understanding us is shown by the con- 
tradictory names given us. One time we are called 
crude materialists whose only desire is to lay hold of 
the wealth of the rich, and another time, when dealing 
with our communistic ideals, we are called inveterate 
idealists. As a matter of fact we are both materialists 
and idealists at the same time. Palpable, true reality is 
our ideal, the ideal of social-democracy is material. 

The " Alphabet of Knowledge for the Thinking," pub- 
lished lately in the V.olksstaat, designated the inductive 
method as the " impregnable basis of all science, which 
builds on facts." The application of this method to all 
problems of the world, that is the systematic applica- 
tion of induction shapes the socialist conception of the 
world into a system. Its categorical imperative is as fol- 
lows : " Thou shalt not begin to speculate without ma- 
terial ; thou shalt base thy deductions, rules and axioms 
on facts only, on palpable realities. Thinking must be- 
gin with data." We begin to speculate, but we don't 
speculate about the beginning. We know once for all, 
that all thinking must begin with some fragment of a 
real phenomenon, with a given beginning; the inquiry 
into the beginning of the beginning is therefore a non- 
sense, contradictory to the general law of logic. Those 
who speak of the beginning of the world imply that 
time was antecedent to the world. " Nothing was " are 
two words which preclude each other. That something 
was which was not, can only be asserted by a shrewd idiot 
who draws square circles. Nothing can only mean : not 
this nor that. Our philosophic system begins with the 



142 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

knowledge that beginning and end are, if I may say so, 
subjective modes, or categories, of the human mind. 

And as logical as the beginning is our sequence. The 
whole metaphysics, which Kant sums up as the question 
after God, free will and immortality, finds its final 
solution in our system, through our knowledge that un- 
derstanding and reason is an absolutely inductive fac- 
ulty. That is, our comprehension of the world is perfect 
when we arrange and divide the empirical things accord- 
ing to their general qualities in species, classes, concep- 
tions, etc. This is quite a truism which would hardly 
be worth discussing but for the superstitious and ideolo- 
gues who are never tired of jabbering about deduction. 
They assert that our intellect possesses still a second 
method in ascertaining the truth, though simple, pal- 
pable truth is inductive. But they claim that in math- 
ematics for instance, the deductive method is supreme 
and independent of experience. Knowing that two and 
two equals four we also KNOW that the same result 
would be obtained in heaven and on earth and always 
and everywhere. Insofar we also know of times and 
dimensions which no human eye ever perceived and no 
human ear ever heard. That a camel has two humps 
was a simple experience, but that two and two equal 
four, or that the part is smaller than the whole is claimed 
to be a transcendental, metaphysical truth, a deduction 
from pure reason. They believe, so to speak, in an inner 
light which revealed them the mysteries of mathematics, 
ethics, the existence of God, the immortality of the soul, 
freedom of will and other transcendental moonshine. 
Thanks to the idealistic studies of a Descartes, Spinoza, 
Leibnitz, Kant, Fichte, Hegel we were able to advance to 
our materialistic philosophy, to reveal the deductive 
ghost of the transcendentalists. The celebrities of phil- 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY I43 

osophy have one after another so far promoted and 
strengthened the cause of truth that we social-democrats, 
standing on their shoulders, are able to understand com- 
pletely the mechanical nature of all knowledge of the 
religions, the speculative as well as the mathematical. 
It may sound strange that that knowledge is due to our 
party standpoint, considering that a scientific result is a 
human affair. Yet, our assertion is easily comprehen- 
sible, for social-democracy does not represent a party, but 
humanity. The party of the disinherited is the party of 
the disinterested, is the party of impartial truth. We 
social-democrats have the easiest access to philosophy, 
for our mind is not dimmed by narrow selfishness. 

The transcendental certainty, the deduction which is to 
be found in the proposition that two and two equal 
four, is, like any other deduction, a mere subterfuge; 
four and two times two are but different terms for one 
and the same thing. Everything has a certain sub- 
stance. Smaller parts form the substance of the whole; 
handle and blade form the substance of a knife; two 
mountains have a dale between, and in the number four 
is contained two times two. Thus, because the sub- 
stance is quite mechanically given in a thing, we are 
apodictically certain and transcendentally convinced that 
two times two equal four, the part is smaller than the 
whole, the knife is not without a handle and a blade, 
and two mountains are not without a valley. Where 
only the wet is called water, there we don't need any 
special transcendental faculty to know categorically that 
water must be wet. No special light is necessary to 
attain to the understanding that deduction, like any other 
profane knowledge, is based in the last resort on em- 
pirical facts. Yet, after all inquiries into facts, and after 



144 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

all understanding of their bearing, they are not a whit 
less miraculous than before. So, for instance, we know 
that grape-juice turns almost overnight into an intox- 
icating liquor. How is that to be comprehended ? The 
chemist will tell you : " It is fermentation. Grape-sugar, 
exposed to the influence of heat and air, turns into al- 
cohol." Thus the incomprehensible is explained, the 
production of wine is a chemical process belonging to the 
general class of fermentation. Facts are comprehended 
by ranging and classifying them into a certain system, 
and not by dissolving them into logical alcohol. Philo- 
sophic mysticism is an undigested remnant of the theo- 
logical period. In order to dispose of both of them in 
a radical manner it is necessary to be imbued with the 
knowledge that facts do not rest on logical grounds, 
but conversely that the fundamental basis of all logic is 
ever the fact, the being, the external reality. 

I must apologize, my friends, for troubling you with 
such hair-splitting dissertations. I am quite aware that 
there are but few among us who care for such discus- 
sions, but the few are just sufficient for our purpose. 
It is necessary that some of us should be able to face 
official philosophy. We must lay bare the foundation of 
our theory in order that the sight of its granitic rock 
shall demonstrate in a striking manner to the impartial 
observer how shifty the sands are on which the braggarts 
of the existing order have piled up their contradictions. 
They reason without any system, without any logic or 
consistency. They have advanced the proposition that 
everything must have a cause, a beginning and an end. 
But how do they demonstrate it? They demonstrate it 
with the belief in a God who has no beginning, and in 
a life which has no end. The same lack of consistency 
is to be found in the politics of the existing order. One 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY I45 

of its organic laws promises freedom of public meeting 
and speech; but where the people make use of that 
freedom and come together to express their sentiments 
and thoughts, there the policeman is set on them. Is 
this system, logic or consistency ? O, yes ! It is the 
system of infamy. All the deeds and thoughts of our 
rulers are concentrated in the logical idea : We are at the 
top and we mean to stay there for good. 

VI. 

Our last considerations were devoted to the traditional 
saying : " Man needs religion," which we ventured to 
translate into reasonable language by declaring : " Man 
needs system." It is his intellectual need to gain a 
safe standpoint from which he could survey the world. 
In order not to go astray in the midst of the bewilder- 
ing multitude of phenomena, man divides the heavens 
into constellations of stars, the cosmos into regions, and 
likewise our earth into classes, species, families and in- 
dividuals. In short, he gives diversity diversified names. 
To have system implies the ability of finding one's way 
and of classifying things. That an animal is the subject 
of zoology, and a plant the subject of botany is easily 
grasped, but it is by no means so easy to tell the 
branch of knowledge where such notions as truth, free- 
dom, justice, etc., belong to. No system is perfect un- 
less it has found a place for every phenomenon, has 
classified everything and has made provisions for every- 
thing. Founders of religion as well as philosophers at- 
tempted to make such systems, but none has stood the 
test. The stream of time has brought and is still bring- 
ing to light new phenomena, new experiences, new 
things for which no provision was made. They don't 
fit into the prevailing system, and therefore a new one 



I46 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

was necessary, until social-democracy was wise enough 
to construct a system of thought sufficiently comprehen- 
sive for all present and future phenomena. 

This is apparently an overweening assertion. In order 
to justify it I must somewhat retrace the steps we have 
taken until now. As the theologians look for a God 
who unites in his personality the omnipotence of the 
world, so the philosophers have been searching for a sys- 
tem which concentrates all knowledge in a single knot, 
so as to swallow all science in one bite. We know, how- 
ever, that a color cannot be green and blue and yellow 
and black at the same time; that is, that the whole 
species cannot be incorporated in one individual. All 
science cannot be concentrated in a single human being 
and still less in a single conception. Yet, I ventured to 
assert that we possess such a concentration. Or does not 
the conception of matter contain all materials of the 
world ? 

So, too, has all science one general form in common, 
namely the inductive method. That the induction is the 
only general form of science, and that induction can be 
applied to all problems, to all objects — this conviction 
lends to social-democracy its systematic steadiness, its 
mental superiority, which astonish our opponents. We do 
not know everything, but we know the general form of 
all science and use it as a touchstone to find out all the 
tricks played against the people by the henchmen of our 
rulers. In natural science the inductive method is well- 
known, but that there is in it a systematic philosophy 
which is destined to put an end to all religious, philo- 
sophical and political humbug, this is a social-democratic 
novelty and acquisition. 

Our opponents, the rulers and the rich, the progressives, 
liberals and free-masons are also advocates of induction 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY I47 

— but only insofar as it suits their purpose. They di- 
vide everything: the people into masters and servants; 
life into an earthly and heavenly one ; the person into 
body and soul ; and science into induction and deduction. 

Now, dividing and classifying cannot be objected to, 
provided that there is system, that the divided parts are 
kept under one heading, and that the diversity is known 
to be but a gradual one. It is not unreasonable to divide 
life into an earthly and a spiritual one, but when so doing 
we must be conscious that both are forms of the self- 
same life, and that both are of equal value. Social-dem- 
ocrats, too, have a body and a soul. Our body is the 
sum total of our corporeal qualities, and our soul is the 
sum total of our mental qualities. Yet, we must always 
remember that the empirical phenomenon comprises all 
matters uniformly, and that it is the common term for 
flesh and soul, for body and spirit. Soul or spirit is in 
our opinion an attribute of the world and not, as the 
priest asserts to the contrary, the world the attribute or 
the handiwork of the spirit. Darwin teaches the descent 
of man from animal. He, too, differentiates man from 
animal, but only as two products of the same material, 
as two varieties of the same species, as two sequences 
in the same system. A systematic and consistent classi- 
fication of this kind, as well as the cosmic unity is un- 
known to our opponents. In this respect the good old 
religious life must be commended. It had at least a 
certain system. Earthly and heavenly life, lordship and 
slavery, faith and knowledge, were all under the united 
and centralized government of Him who said : "I am 
the Lord, thy God." 

I know quite well, that the believers, too, have a dual- 
ism and are guilty of a relative lack of system. I am 
quite aware that they are fluttering between heaven and 



I48 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

earth. However, before the liberal wedge of doubt had 
entered the religious flesh, when religion was a more 
serious affair, it was also less dualistic. The devil was 
but a tool, the earthly life but a transitional term of 
probation for the eternal life. One was subordinated to 
the other. There was a center of gravity and a system. 
In comparison with modern half-heartedness and free- 
masonry, religion did encompass the whole in a mon- 
istic manner. 

This consistent encompassing of the whole, my dear 
friends, is a difficult problem with which the human 
mind has grappled since it began working. The nine- 
teenth century has solved the problem and given phil- 
osophy a system. If in spite of all the light and leading 
of our thinkers and scientists, people are still groping 
in the dark, it must be due to political reasons. Re- 
actionary ill-will has scented the revolutionary conse- 
quences of the inductive method. Hegel himself was 
already cautious enough to put his light under the bushel. 
And his more courageous followers could not make 
headway at a time when conservative vileness governed 
supreme. Even to this day the privileged classes are do- 
ing their utmost to keep the smouldering embers well 
under the ashes. Comrades, let us fan them into flames. 
When they are aglow all the children of the night will 
disappear. 

The stomach can't go on without food and drink, nor 
the head without a system, that is, without a connected 
view of life, a " final cause " from which everything pro- 
ceeds. This final cause is rather a ticklish thing. 

According to the religious systems God is the final 
cause. Liberal ideologues believe it possible to base 
everything on reason. Prejudiced materialists find in 
hidden atoms the final cause of the universe, while social- 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY I49 

democrats demonstrate everything by induction. We 
hold to induction on principle, that is we know that 
knowledge cannot be got by deduction, by drawing from 
pure reason, but that it is gained through the instrumen- 
tality of reason from experience. 

That logical method is already known to other peo- 
ple, but they lack the systematic knowledge of it, they 
lack consistency. The philosophy of the anti-socialists 
is not homogeneous ; it is rather a mixture of induction 
and deduction. They know how to induce, but they 
don't know the system of induction. They are well ac- 
quainted with details, but they utterly fail when dealing 
with the general aspect of the world. They can readily 
find the beginning and end of a certain thing, they can 
tell in concrete cases which is sham and which reality. 
But when confronted with the question of the general 
beginning or of the general relation of truth, justice, 
energy, matter, unity and multiplicity, cause and effect 
— they are at their wits' end and the rearing of the 
Tower of Babel begins. Some quote the Revelation, 
others take refuge in Kant or in some other venerable 
classic, still others forsake theology and philosophy al- 
together and apply themselves to scientific experiments 
and expect the solution of the problem from natural 
science. 

In the face of such a helpless muddle international 
social-democracy is proud to know the " final cause " on 
which everything rests, and to possess a scientific basis 
for everything, and a systematic philosophy. Our de- 
cided superiority of principle is clearly manifested by the 
unanimity of our aspirations and demands, while our op- 
ponents are hopelessly divided on all questions of religion 
and politics. To be sure, there are differences of opinion 
in our ranks too, yet the anti-socialists have no reason 



150 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

whatsoever to rail at the dissensions among the social- 
democrats. We quarrel about detail, about forms of or- 
ganizations, about practical and tactical questions, but in 
general principles and in matters of theory we stand as 
a solid and united phalanx, shoulder to shoulder, for we 
have what the Old- and New-Catholics, Protestants and 
Freethinkers would like to have: we have system. The 
beginning and end of all philosophy is clear to us. 

Of course, comrades, this does not mean that every 
social-democrat possesses a full knowledge of the sys- 
tem. Not all of us have received a systematic training, 
else there would be no need for my preaching. What I 
ventured to assert is that your social-democratic aspira- 
tions proceed from systematic science. I assert that the 
inductive demonstration of a thing is the only, true, 
scientific demonstration, and that a consistent application 
of induction yields very remarkable anti-religious and 
revolutionary results. I should very much like to enter 
into details illustrating my assertion, but I must for the 
present abstain from that in order to first consolidate the 
foundation of our philosophy. 

I repeat, and as a preacher who is anxious to drive 
home his teaching I am entitled to repeat : In the place 
of religion social-democracy puts a systematic conception 
of the universe. 

This philosophy finds its " final cause " in the real 
conditions. The philosophy of the Liberals acts in the 
same way in natural science and in business only, while 
in matters of human society it looks for the final cause 
in the revelations of reason, instead of religion. They 
want their notions of justice, truth and liberty to be the 
models for an equitable, true and free society. The fact 
that feudal as well as liberal and clerical ideals of justice, 
freedom, political truth and wisdom have been moulded 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 151 

after the material interests of those respective parties, 
could not fail to teach us that ideals do not spring from 
the human head, but are formed by the human head 
from empirical materials. 

Therefore we are able to mould consciously and with 
systematic consistency our notions of justice and liberty 
after our material needs, that is the needs of the pro- 
letariat, of the masses. The real bodily need and the 
present possibility of a " life worth living " is the " final 
cause " from which spring the equity, truth and ration- 
ality of the social-democratic demands. In the system 
of induction the body precedes the spirit and the fact the 
notion. 

The frequent use of one and the same word having 
a soporific effect on the mind, I shall for a change call 
our system " The System of Experimental Truth." The 
dawdlers of the bourgeois parties talk a good deal of 
divine, moral, logical, etc., truths. We, however, know 
of no divine truth, we but know the empirical truth. We 
may divide it into parts and give them special names, but 
its general character will remain. Truths, no matter 
how we call them, are based on physical, corporeal, ma- 
terial experience. As such they are but parts or classes 
of the experimental system. We cut only from one, 
from one whole. We demonstrate our propositions em- 
pirically and really, and our procedure is systematic and 
logical. Could there be, my friends, anything more evi- 
dent than such evidence? 

Having laid bare the foundation we proceed to look 
at the structure of our universal system from the most 
elevated point of vantage. We see the infinite diversity 
of things to consist of the same homogeneous, empirical 
material. All diverse qualities possess one general qual- 
ity. How different they may be, big or small, ponderable 



152 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

or imponderable, spiritual or physical, all things of the 
world have this in common, that they are empirical ob- 
jects of our intellect. From the standpoint of the in- 
ductive system the world and all it contains forms but 
one homogeneous object. All its details are but modal- 
ities of the absolute unity. Physical phenomena or em- 
pirical materials are the universal species in relation to 
which all other classes are but subdivisions. It is the 
only substance and truth, everything else is but a quality 
and a relative manifestation. Solid and liquid, wood and 
metal, are quite correctly summed up under the notion 
" matter." Why should we not be justified in summing 
up all things under the term " empirical truth " or " em- 
pirical phenomenon ? " Nothing can prevent us then 
from dividing it into organic and inorganic, into physical 
and moral, into good and bad, etc. Through the common 
origin all antagonisms are conciliated and bridged over. 
Diversity is but a form; in their essence all things are 
alike. The final cause of all things is the empirical 
phenomenon. The empirical material is the general ele- 
mentary substance. It is absolute, eternal and omnipres- 
ent. Where it ends, all reasoning is at an end. 

The inductive system may as well be called the 
dialectic or evolutionary system. Here we find what 
is more and more being proved by natural science, that 
seemingly essential differences are but differences in de- 
gree. However strict we may be in determining the 
specific characteristics which differentiate the organic 
from the inorganic or the plants from the animals, Na- 
ture shows that the lines of demarcation disappear and 
the differences and antagonisms coalesce. The cause ef- 
fects and the effect causes. The truth appears and th& 
appearance is true. As heat and cold differ but in de- 
gree, so do good and bad — they are all relative manifes- 



THE RELIGION OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 1 53 

tations of the same substance, and forms or classes of 
physical experience. 

I see in the audience some new guests to whom the 
monism which I preach appears to be so strange and 
unheard of that they are very anxious to hurl against 
me the most insipid objections. They would like to ask 
how it was possible to prove that empirical material is 
the primary component part of all objects of science? 
And are there no such things as God, pure reason and 
moral world? 

By such questions you may see, my friends, how 
deeply rooted irrationality is in man. God, pure reason, 
moral world and many other things do not consist of 
empirical material; they are not forms of the physical 
phenomenon and we deny therefore their existence. Yet, 
the ideas, with which this kind of reasoning operates, 
have appeared physically and have a real existence and 
can be made the subject-matter of our inductive exam- 
ination. The terms physical, empirical, etc., are gen- 
erally understood in their narrower sense. I supple- 
ment them therefore with the adjective " experimental.' , 

The denominational systems of the religious, and the 
rational systems of the freethinkers put up different 
claims. The system of empirical truth, to which social- 
democracy adheres, can only be based on induction; it 
recognizes only those notions, doctrines and theories 
which are consciously taken from empirical material. 
From the height of that system we discover the bridge 
which unites philosophy with natural science. The 
bridge is constructed from one rock, the rock of all wis- 
dom which consists of the knowledge that the human in- 
tellect is an inductive instrument. All specific disciplines 
are but applications of this general truth and science. 
The intellect is the commander-in-chief of all knowledge. 



154 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

The specialties of science are his subordinates. The 
systems of astronomy or chemistry, botany or optics are 
departments of the general system. 

Those of my audience, who despite having carefully 
followed my dissertations, have not grasped yet the full 
bearing of socialist philosophy, I beg to consider how 
impossible it is to do full justice to a subject of that 
magnitude within the compass of a half an hour. And 
if I wanted to work it out more completely, I should 
fear to tire my audience. 

However, many an opportunity will present itself in 
the course of our lectures to take up the matter again. 
For the present it must suffice to have laid bare the 
foundation and to have strengthened and solidified out 
party-consciousness by turning the attention of the com- 
rades to the first principles of socialism. 



ETHICS OF SOCIAL-DEMOCRACY 

TWO SERMONS 
(VOLKSSTAAT, 1 875) 

I 

Comrades and Friends: 

It is the desire of our party to realize that which the 
enlightened minds of all ages and nations wanted to 
realize: truth and justice. We do not want the truth 
and justice of the clergy. Ours is the material, empirical 
truth of applied science which we want first to know and 
then to practice. Impelled by the necessity of realizing 
a life worth living, we are interested in various kinds of 
truth, and especially also in that which is true justice, 
or in the " moral world." 

The world cannot exist without morality and order, 
not because, as the parson has it, they came from heaven, 
or that they were, according to professorial wisdom, 
prescribed by some eternal code of laws, but because 
they are a universal, palpable need. In one of my last 
sermons I have already discussed the matter how we 
international social-democrats are trying to systematically 
demonstrate all our thoughts by real or experimental 
facts. Let us in our present disquisition of morality 
apply " our system " and see how it works. Also the 
ethical law cannot lay claim to more consideration and 
validity than is warranted by its material basis. 

The animals, apes or rabbits, have neither shame nor 

i55 



I56 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

morality, neither fidelity nor faith. At least, their moral 
degree equals naught. The Caffirs have but little of it, 
our bourgeois class slightly more, and it is left to the 
socialists to teach them what is really just. In other 
words : morality is the result of the historic development, 
it is a product of evolution. It has its origin in the 
social instincts of the human race, in the material neces- 
sity of social life. Seeing that the ideals of social de- 
mocracy are one and all directed towards a higher order 
of social life, they must necessarily be moral ideals. 

As long as mankind has been grouped in clans, hordes, 
tribes, nations and states, some kind of order and laws 
have been necessary. But we cannot tell beforehand 
what those laws and institutions contain, or in other 
words, what conduct is to be regarded as just and equit- 
able, for that depends on the conditions in which de- 
terminate social organization lives. The most import- 
ant conditions are those of production of material goods. 
They decide, in the last resort, what is to be regarded 
as just and equitable. But inasmuch as they are not 
unchangeable and abiding, the laws of morality cannot 
be eternal. Indeed, they change with the changes in 
political economy. The morality and laws of hunters, 
shepherds, knights and bourgeois differ greatly from 
each other. As far as political economy is based on 
small private means of production, the old saying holds 
good: 

" Remember hell and you are bless'd. 
What's not your own let smartly rest." 

To-day private economy has reached its climax; the 
administrators of the national wealth are ardent individ- 
ualists. Private property is the highest ideal ; its whole 
mechanism, administrative and legal, constitutes the 



ETHICS OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 1 57 

" moral world." What has until now been considered 
as moral and just is rapidly fading away. Honesty, up- 
rightness, integrity, family discipline, diligence and thrift 
are virtues of the lower middle class, of respectable 
peasants, artisans, tradespeople, who are trying to get 
some legacy and to perserve it, or to carry on their little 
business in the way their forefathers did. Modern capital 
with its new instruments of production is slowly crowd- 
ing out all those classes and their moral conceptions. 
People who get rich in one night, or who carry on ma- 
chine bakeries, have a different moral standard from 
those who earn an honest dollar or two a day, or who 
knead the dough in the sweat of their brow. We don't 
know to-day whether five, five and twenty, or five hun- 
dred per cent, are " honest earnings " or not. Our pillars 
of society just manage to escape penal servitude and our 
state attorneys are getting corrupt. The capitalist econ- 
omy has a disintegrating effect upon morality and prop- 
erty. Our higher classes, like the Turks, buy themselves 
as many women as their income permits. Polygamy and 
the keeping of mistresses have become the custom, the 
ethos, and are an ethical fact. Indeed, free love is not 
a whit less moral than Christian monogamy. But the 
reason why we object to polygamy does not lie in the 
great variety of one's love-making, but in the venality 
of the women, in the degradation of the human being 
and in the disgraceful rule of Mammon. 

Morality in human evolution is similar to matter in 
natural evolution: the essence is abiding, the forms are 
fleeting. 

"A great part of our lower classes," writes 
Treitschke, " have become in matters of dress and in 
several other external things, more like the middle 
classes, but in their sense of duty and honor they are 



I58 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

farther than ever from the educated classes." But that 
" great part of the lower classes " are not only aiming 
at widening the ethical gulf between themselves and the 
other classes, they are also at work to acquire different 
philosophical conceptions. The religious conception of 
knaves and fools is selfish enough to mistake its own in- 
terests for those of the community. The ruling classes 
have always and everywhere shown the disposition to 
consider their own selfish morality as the general ethical 
law and have tried to impose it as such upon the people. 
Socialists are not likely to be caught by such priestly 
snares. As far back as 1848 our " Communist Mani- 
festo " declared : " The ruling ideas of each age have 
ever been the ideas of its ruling class." Now Social- 
democracy rebels against all class-rule and against all rul- 
ing conceptions of duty, honor and culture. We quite ad- 
mit that, despite all historical changes, there have always 
been officers and privates. " And so will it be forever," 
say the officers. But the privates have their own views 
about that; they cannot fail to notice that in the period 
which has passed since the warrior chiefs, the patriarchs, 
Caesars and knights, to the present captains of industry, 
the people have become more and more self-conscious and 
independent; they find that there is such a thing as 
progressive development of history and arrive quite nat- 
urally at the reasonable conclusion to cut the rope which 
Treitschke, Sybel, etc., have laid down as the " founda- 
tion of society." The professors are undoubtedly right 
in saying that domination was heretofore a necessary evil 
or a fact justified by reason. But also human progress 
towards freedom is an undeniable fact. To our rulers, 
however, the lesson of history does not consist in free- 
dom, but in dominion. They are only concerned with the 
question whether the officers will remain forever or 



ETHICS OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 1 59 

whether they will have to go. We social-democrats 
boldly assert that they will have to go overboard in order 
that morality may prevail. We assert, furthermore, that 
the revolution of the present " moral world " is a necessary 
act of true morality. Thus our views of morality differ 
greatly from those of the ethical braggarts. 

And now I should like to explain to you, dear com- 
rades, in words as concise as possible in what the real 
essence of morality consists. Guided by our dialectic- 
materialist conception and method, we look first, as usual 
in all our researches, for the material, also in this case 
for the ethical material, making use hereby of the term- 
inology of every-day language. True peaches are all 
those which people usually call peaches. There are many 
kinds of them, as of morality. There it is a moral law to 
slaughter the enemy, to fry and eat him ; here, on the 
contrary, the moral law commands to love the enemy 
and do good to him. Be a crafty rascal, says the 
Spartan law ; sanctify property, pay the debts, commands 
the bourgeois. In view of such contradictions how are 
we to pull the sparks of truth out of the fire ? Evidently 
by extracting the general out of the diversity, by find- 
ing what it is that has constituted the moral and just 
under all conditions. It cannot consist in something 
particular, but in the general in the abstraction of the 
whole moral material. To find such a rule it is there- 
fore necessary to inquire into a sufficient quantity of 
moral facts; in other words, we must use the inductive 
method. By means of this method we find that the 
moral world generally consists of the considerations dic- 
tated by the social need of a given human organization. 
Then we find the undeniable fact that that social neces- 
sity develops with the progress of productive $oj™~* 
called civilization, that the social instinct of man gro^>,- 



l60 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

that human association becomes broader and deeper, 
and that morality becomes more moral. Even Christian 
morality demands that the limited brotherly feeling of 
the clan, horde, nation and state shall expand into in- 
ternational brotherhood. But its inordinate religious 
spirit, its admixture of hypocrisy and foolery, prevented 
the ideal from being realized. It is economic materialism 
only, it is but the communistic re-construction of society 
on the basis of material work, which will bring about 
the true association of men. Only from the abolition of 
class-rule, from the transformation of the selfish capital- 
istic organizations into co-operative instruments of pro- 
duction will issue the true brotherhood of man, the true 
morality and justice. 

No divine oracle, no inner voice or pure deduction 
from the brain shall teach us moral truth or any other 
truth. That ideological way leads only to an insipid 
hankering after a supernatural, unchanging and un- 
changeable truth. A clear scientific result can only 
be won by induction ; it is always based on experimental 
and verifiable facts ; in our present case, on the es- 
tablished fact, that men need and serve each other. That 
what is right to one person is equitable to another one 
is as certain as that men need one another. With the 
growth of the necessity for mutual service among men, 
their association becomes more extensive and intensive, 
their intercourse more considerate, and their morality at- 
tains to a higher and truer standard. Social-democracy 
is thus quite aware that man is limited by the nature of 
things. But having recognized the general, or the so- 
called true essence of morality, we refuse to be mystified 
by those who want to palm off a particular phenomenon 
or form for the general essence of morality. Whether 
people marry or live in free-love, whether private prop- 



ETHICS OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY l6l 

erty is sacred or wicked, whether revenge is permitted or 
prohibited, are customs which may be qualified as moral 
or immoral in the same measure as they promote or 
hinder human progress. And with social-democrats, hu- 
man evolution is no mere ideological drivel or spiritual 
perfection for which there is no material test and which 
is therefore exposed to the wildest interpretations. With 
us, human progress means, as often stated, the growing 
control of man over nature to serve his needs. In view 
of that great purpose, religion, art, science and morality 
are simply helpmates. I repeat: the narrower or wider, 
the looser or closer state of social aggregation changes 
the law of morality. The higher or lower grade of mor- 
ality is measured by the degree of social interdependence. 
Yet, the mere knowledge of the moral law is not suf- 
ficient to be able to make use of it in practice ; the general 
conditions must be ripe for it. Theoretically we may 
easily grasp the highest degree of morality; in prac- 
tice, however, things go through their historical stages. 
The customs of the barbarians must pass before we at- 
tain to higher ones. Where people live by hunting and 
fishing, there the sense of brotherhood of man cannot be 
as developed as where the proletarians of all countries 
are striving for unity. 

That " all men are brothers " and that "' thou shalt love 
thy neighbor as thyself," was well known before Christ. 
That thy neighbor meant any human being who most 
urgently needed help was likewise recognized several 
thousand years ago, it was turned into a dogma and 
hedged round with divine blessings and cursings. But 
that does not prevent our educated believers from main- 
taining in commerce and on the pulpit the diametrically 
opposed proposition : " Every man for himself." 

Religious *ruth U 4 fantastic ideology. According to 



162 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

it love of humanity is based on the belief in God and on 
freedom of will. And what is the result ot it? The 
war of classes and of nations. We want to follow the 
opposite way and to establish eternal peace on a brotherly 
organization of economics. As in family life, where the 
man tills the soil, the woman cooks its produce and the 
children gather firewood, domestic harmony is based 
on domestic economy, and spiritual peace on material co- 
operation, so will love of humanity only be realized when 
the production of material goods will be socialized. Na- 
ture has undoubtedy implanted in our hearts a yearning 
for brotherhood. But the heart is a very unreliable com- 
pass, and even will and knowledge, as all ideological 
factors in general, are not to be trusted as guides if they 
are without any material basis. Else it would be quite 
incomprehensible why there is so little love of humanity 
among the ruling classes. If they have their pockets full 
of dollars they will surely help their destitute brother with 
a few cents. But can we call that loving kindness? 
However, it is not love nor help which is the guiding 
rule of our time, but hammer or anvil. In reality it is 
thus : who does not want to be a servant must try to 
become a master. Under such conditions it is idle to 
hope that people will sacrifice realities for ideal precepts. 
We are not sentimental enough to expect such things. 
Though we use moral arguments in our struggle against 
the bourgeois, we do all we can to stimulate our class 
ronsciousness. We preach eternal peace and stimulate 
the class struggle. We want to abolish all domination by 
establishing our own domination. These contradictions 
appear to our scholars and professors too scholarly. But 
already my grandmother knew that those who make 
every day Sunday have no Sunday, that is, where all 
govern nobody governs. When a handful of people now 



ETHICS OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 163 

control all the means of production, then their rule is a 
curse to humanity. When however the working class 
overcomes their oppressors, wrests from them their power 
and takes over the administration of the commonwealth, 
then all class rule ceases and democratic rule begins. 
The working class is but nominally a class, in reality 
they are the people whose rule is no domination but 
a morally, that is, socially justified regime. 

The bourgeois class are fantastic in theory, but in 
practice they are quite sober and provident moralists 
without any exaggerated notion of benevolence. Their 
practical morality is adapted to circumstances. That is 
as it ought to be, and we shall follow their example. 
But we reject their queer theories according to which 
morality is an idea which they believe to have received 
from some lofty regions. In their opinion this wicked 
world ought to be shaped after that idea. Here our 
ways separate. We conceive the real world with its 
human history as the living material, out of which we 
consciously produce the abstract idea of morality, the 
ideal morality. At the same time social-democracy is at 
work to realize the ideal of brotherhood by a social re- 
construction of political economy. 

Ideas, we again repeat that cornerstone of our phil- 
osophy, must be consciously based on experimental ma- 
terial, they must be won by induction if we desire to 
be clear about their meaning and import. And that ap- 
plies to moral and political ideas no less than to scien- 
tific ideas. From the religious standpoint, the world is 
a machine which must have its mechanic. Here things 
are to be conceived as having their origin in the idea, as 
having sprung from the divine idea. The ideas are ac- 
cording to that a kind of transcendental matrix. Nowa- 
days, however, sensible men are quite aware that the 



164 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

ideas of the vegetable and animal kingdom were not 
the models after which those objects were made, but, on 
the contrary, that the ideas are mental abstractions of 
those objects. Quite in the same manner we have to 
rid the ethical idea of its transcendentalism. Ideas are 
notions. Notions may arbitrarily be conceived in a nar- 
rower or wider sense. The notion of nature embraces 
the whole cosmos; the notion of organic embraces but a 
part of nature; the notion of plant or animal a part of 
organic, etc. With our ideas we embrace arbitrarily a 
smaller or larger part of the world wide sphere of ex- 
perience. It is the nature of the idea to be arbitrarily 
conceived in a narrower or wider sense. The idea of an- 
imal kingdom may include animals which may be re- 
garded as plants and, on the other hand, also men who 
may, perhaps, object to such a classification. The truth 
is that ideas cannot be strictly enclosed within their 
seeming boundaries. And so it is with moral ideas, their 
limits cannot be clearly marked. There are actions 
which are of less concern to society than to the person 
who performs them, yet we cannot deny them a certain 
moral value, as for instance cleanliness, temperance, etc. 
An eminently moral activity is the labor of the scholar, 
that drives him over ocean and deserts to face danger and 
privation, and to suffer and die in search of truth. Yet 
we call all these actions virtue and morality, because they 
have a collective or social value, which proves the cor- 
rectness of our definition of morality. 

In conclusion, I should like to reply to one objection : 
If morality has no divine origin, but is a bodily instinct, 
why should those be responsible who are deficient in 
that instinct and therefore commit crimes against the 
social order? Pray, remember, my friends, that the 
social sense is also a product of evolution; it may be 



ETHICS OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 165 

missing or stunted in the ignorant and uneducated, who 
must therefore be taught by humanized disciplinary 
means. 

In the eyes of our opponents we socialists are " ma- 
terialists " — that is, people without enthusiasm for 
ideals who are dull-witted and only like to hear about 
eating and drinking — or who care only about matters 
which can be weighed and measured. In order to abuse 
us they give to materialism a narrow and disreputable 
definition. To such an artful idealism we oppose moral 
truth, that is, an idea or ideal which has either be- 
come flesh or is on the point of becoming flesh. Where 
in heaven or on earth or anywhere else is there an 
ideal which is as truly reasonable, as moral and sublime 
as the idea of international social-democracy? Here the 
word of Christian love is going to be materialized. The 
lamentable brothers in Christo shall become brothers in- 
deed, and in the struggle for transforming the religious 
vale of tears into a real state of the people. Amen. 

II 

Dear Comrades and Friends: 

Before we proceed with our discussion on morality I 
should like to sum up in a few words the essence of the 
foregoing chapter. We have found that different stages 
of human evolution have different moral laws, and 
even so contradictory ones that virtue is in one place 
what is vice in another. The ethical doctrines disagree 
as much as the religious denominations. Each of them 
claims to be the only true and genuine one. And in 
order to arrive at an undisputed view on a much dis- 
puted subject we followed the same course by which 
natural science arrives at its valid conclusions. We ac- 



l66 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

cepted as moral everything which is generally regarded 
as such and searched as Humboldt advises, in the variety 
of facts for mental unity. We have found that the var- 
ious ethical codes are all at one in calling that moral 
which is conducive to a harmonious social conduct. 
Now, everybody knows, that people do not stand still 
like mountains, but meet each other ancf move ahead 
with one another. They also progress in their social re- 
lations. Society grows by degrees in volume and in- 
terdependence. The power and development of men 
grows in the same degree as their social relations be- 
come more intimate, as their sense of solidarity gains in 
strength and the more they consciously advance their 
personal well-being by furthering that of the whole 
community. The principle of morality is the principle 
of human association, and the principle of human as- 
sociation is progress. Social-democracy is nothing else, 
and desires nothing else, but social and co-operative 
progress, and that is the true moral perfection. 

One cannot too often repeat the fact, and you, com- 
rades, are quite aware of it, how shamefully certain 
words are abused, especially " morality " and " progress." 
The so-called progressives, who are crafty and cowardly 
enough to dabble all their life in politics and to ignore 
all social evils, have long been regarded by us as part 
and parcel of the " reactionary mass." Progress of that 
kind is just the opposite to morality. By calling ret- 
rogression " progress," and anti-social selfishness 
" morality," they corrupt the language and notions of 
the people. And they don't do it unconsciously either. 
It is a part of a deep scheme laid with deliberation by 
wicked immorality. Whenever morality demands free- 
dom, freedom of expression, freedom of press, etc., or 
whenever human evolution demands any other con- 



ETHICS OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 1 67 

cession, you will soon find certain people busy with 
castrating these ideals and pawning such gags, under the 
name of freedom, off on the public. Democracy wants 
universal suffrage, but some Napoleon or Bismarck, if he 
finds it necessary to accede to the democratic request, 
takes the sting out of it and presents a harmless toy to 
the masses. Such have always and everywhere been the 
ways by which the nations are misled. It is therefore 
necessary for social-democracy to know that words are 
but names for ideas and that ideas have a flexible mean- 
ing (in proportion to the scope, interrelation, time and 
place of the things they are based upon. Editor). The 
usual misunderstandings of this logical chapter are taken 
advantage of by our oppressors to juggle with words, 
ideas and things and to delude the people. Else it would 
be quite incomprehensible how such a natural thing as 
morality can be presented by our academic quacks as a 
metaphysical wonder! 

In order to get a clear conception of morality let us 
compare it with a tool. The tool is as eternal and yet 
as changeable as morality. Can a knife of the stone 
period be regarded to-day as a knife? It is surely an 
antiquated knife, but no more a knife in the modern 
sense; a knife of to-day must be from steel, and of 
modern finish. But just as a knife consists generally 
of a handle and blade, so is morality in general the 
subordination of personal desires to the local, national 
and, finally, international welfare. Thou shalt subor- 
dinate thy immediate passions to general health and life, 
thy personal needs to the need of society — that is 
moral, reasonable and necessary. Whatever social wel- 
fare temporarily requires, is stipulated by some law. 
The ethical theory of social-democracy is in accord with 
the real state of things. We see in the political admin- 



l68 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

istration of the nation the guardian of morality, but 
we regard it also as our duty to be vigilant and to pre- 
vent the government turning a changeable and transient 
institution like the state into an eternal and holy idol, or 
promoting immoral reaction instead of moral progress, 
and selfish vice instead of communistic morality. By 
subordinating private interests to the commonwealth,* 
social-democracy manifests the sense of true and genuine 
morality. 

" The words," says Schopenhauer, " are no more mas- 
terless, and to lend them a different meaning from that 
they had until now, is simply an abuse." In colloquial 
use the word morality stands for an empirical and live 
fact, for a real, palpable need whose cry is: " To live 
and let live." Morality belongs to the same category 
with all other profane things. It is a natural quality 
inherent in man. Human beings without any moral 
sense are rare exceptions, which, when met with, are 
to be contemplated with the same judicious mental at- 
titude as some other anthropological or physiological ab- 
normities. According to recent researches in the domain 
of natural science " the image of God " is a product 
which with its hair, with its body and soul, with its 
religion and morality, descended from the animal king- 
dom. " As far as I am concerned," says Darwin, " I am 
as willing to derive my descent from that heroic little ape 
which defies its dangerous foe in order to save the life 
of its guardian, or from that old baboon which, coming 
down from the hills, victoriously takes away its young 
comrades from the amazed dogs — as from a savage who 
finds pleasure in torturing his enemies, offers up sanguin- 
ary sacrifices, commits child murder without any com- 
punction, treats his wives as slaves, knows no decency 

1 Of course in conscious furtherance of the personal interests. — Ediio*. 



ETHICS OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 169 

and is controlled by the grossest superstition." And in- 
deed, my friends, it is more praiseworthy to work oneself 
up from brutality to the social-democratic ideal than to 
sink from a heaven-born Adam to the Christian worm, 
who, conscious of his sinful nonentity, creeps in the dust 
of humility. 

Progress is moral, and morality is progressive. As 
all other things in the world, morality is in constant 
evolution. It begins its existence with the animal, but 
does not win the name until it has grown in man. Fit- 
ness and efficiency, that is morality and virtue in the life 
of our species must, as everything else, struggle for ex- 
istence against arrant reaction. Worthless survivals are 
known in biology as rudiments, they are reactions of a 
past generation upon their posterity. We came to know 
the same reactionary element as the vicious enemy of 
historic evolution. Just as there are men who move 
their scalp monkey-like or their ears mule-like, so are 
there brutal progressives with an atavistic morality. 

It is well known that one progressive reform super- 
sedes the other : true progress is therefore the radical, the 
farthest-reaching progress. Truly moral is only the most 
intimate and altruistic social organization. That the big 
is small in relation to the bigger, the small is big in 
relation to the smaller; that what is a heavy burden to 
man is an easy thing to the ass — the relativity of qual- 
ities big, small, heavy, etc., is generally acknowledged. 
None the less I think it necessary to draw special at- 
tention to the relativity of the moral adjective. It hap- 
pens with moral laws as with tools. In the course of 
time the cunningly contrived tools come to be regarded as 
ridiculously clumsy; and what was once moral becomes 
in the course of evolution immoral. Compared with 
socialistic morality, bourgeois morality is an immoral 



170 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

disgrace. Morality thus demands radical progress or an 
unbroken series of revolutions. 

With the final triumph of social-democracy, human 
culture will start on its road of conscious and endless 
progress. Until now mankind advanced in a more or 
less unconscious manner. It is only we social-demo- 
crats who deliberately put the principle of progress to 
the front. Until now all progressive parties had de- 
fined limits which, when once reached, checked their 
movement and turned action into reaction. The greatest 
heroes of civilization and thought finished by clogging 
the wheel of progress which they had once accelerated. 
Moses, Aristotle, Christ, Luther, Kant and Hegel had 
a most beneficial effect on the course of history until 
they became saints. Then all their celebrated systems 
turned into as many stumbling blocks. Of course, our 
wiseacres have a ready answer to that. They assert that 
those men of light and leading have been misunder- 
stood by humanity which corrupted their teachings. But 
as true progressives we know better. Those heroes 
could not have a permanent influence, because they had 
not penetrated to the true principle of morality. They 
mistook the particular for the general, and morals for 
morality. All ethical prescriptions, are good, but in a lim- 
ited sense. Only the limitless progress is always good 
and absolutely moral. To lay down regulations for all 
times and conditions, as our system makers claimed to 
have done, is in the highest degree immoral. 

We have seen that morality is based upon the general 
need for social co-operation. With the growth of that 
need, morality and civilization grow. The continued de- 
velopment of morality is as necessary to the welfare of 
our race as food for the body. Any moral prescription 
which claims to be more than a local or temporary ex- 



ETHICS OF SOCIAL DEMOCRACY 171 

pediency turns necessarily into an immoral limitation, just 
as a prescribed bill of fare turns finally into an unbear- 
able diet. As bread is a general food, so is truth a 
general virtue. But remember, my friends, that that fact 
is by no means a metaphysical prescription with a claim 
to eternal validity, but an empirical rule which admits 
of exceptions. An absolute right is, like an absolute 
truth, theological or metaphysical moonshine. The moral 
world has but one commandment: permanent social 
progress, limitless social evolution. 

Christian irrationality, which separates the soul from 
the body, separates also the moral from the physical 
progress. It removes morality from the sphere of life 
and action into the narrow closet of feeling, into the 
secret chamber of the heart. No doubt, a good heart 
is one of the conditions of sociability, but that is formed 
in human intercourse, in society, and not in a monastery. 
Although nobody goes now into the solitude of the forest 
to live on roots and herbs in order to get a moral educa- 
tion, yet the monastic principle of morality is still prev- 
alent. Where the universe is believed to have sprung 
from God's head, and the truth from pure reason, or 
kindness and justice from the inner voice of the heart, 
there the wrong path of ideological deduction is still 
trodden. The undue separation of the moral from the 
corporeal and of mental culture from material well-being 
is a theory which appears to be especially made for the 
benefit of the exploiters of the people. The bitter toil 
of the people is to be sweetened by moral sugar. The 
ruling classes, while praising misery, sorrow and pain 
as a moral crucible, are giving themselves the immoral 
pleasure of the separated progress of their body. We 
social-democrats, though distinguishing things and con- 
ditions by names and conceptions, are quite aware that 



172 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

in practice all things merge into one another, especially 
the physical and the moral. 

Spiritualistic as the language of the monks was, serf- 
dom, tithes and charity were the material support of their 
moral twaddle. The same tune, though with some varia- 
tion, is played by our capitalists. They know the hard- 
ships in the life of Robinson Crusoe, but refuse to know 
how their private wealth has been got out of social 
labor. Their interest prevents their seeing how deeply 
immoral or unsocial an economic system is which pays 
the " neighbor " a disproportionally small share of the 
product he created by an excessive amount of dire 
work. 

Exact, inductive science teaches the social-democrat 
that the moral world or the brotherly progress is still a 
socialist scheme, though at the same time a categorical 
imperative which impels him to work on unswervingly 
and with all the moral earnestness at his command for 
a radical transformation of political economy. No par- 
son and no professor shall talk us out of that. 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 

SEVEN CHAPTERS 

(VOLKSSTAAT, 1 876) 

I. 

It is with pride and joy that our comrades look upon 
the successes achieved in a comparatively short time in 
the cause of Socialism. The numerous adherents, the 
large concourse we owe, I think, to the sense of degrada- 
tion and misery which burns in the hearts of the people. 
But the splendid discipline, the never-failing tact and the 
harmonious working of the rank and file we must ascribe 
to the clear grasp and the systematic comprehension of 
our theory. Without that the socialist would be to-day 
what he was heretofore: tender-hearted, but muddle- 
headed. ' 

The first English and French socialists whose 
thoughts flashed through the horizon of the end of the 
eighteenth century, were not slow in recognizing the 
exploiting and antagonistic character of our champions 
of " free property." They saw the negative element, the 
taint of the deadly disease, within the heart of the factory 
system. They foretold with ingenious lucidity the decay 
of the middle-class, the slow, but inevitable divorce of 
the peasantry and the artisans from their means of pro- 
duction, the transformation of the small producers into 
wage-slaves, finally the rapid increase of misery and 
of the number of the proletarian class. But they failed 

173 



174 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

to recognize that the elements of the positive remedy 
are to be found in the laws underlying economic de- 
velopments, and that human history in its evolution does 
not only bring forth problems, but organically contains 
their solution. In their purely ideological conception of 
the world they believed it ought to be possible to invent 
some scheme for the building up of a true and just 
society. This error of judgment could not but lead to 
day-dreaming. Every one of these amiable dreamers 
looked for proselytes and went with them to America or 
Icaria. One built up a Harmony, the other a New 
Jerusalem. There were as many sects as ingenious 
minds to found them. They exhausted themselves in dis- 
cussing Republic and Monarchy, dictatorial or constitu- 
tional government, limited or universal suffrage, and all 
the intermediate forms of government. They brandished 
all manner of flags, two- and three-colored, blue and 
red ones. However, for logical sequence, scientific con- 
sistency and harmonious action, one searched in vain. 

Amidst this chaotic state of social and political specu- 
lation appeared Marx and Engels who, besides their 
warm devotion to the cause of the people and to social- 
ism, possessed the necessary philosophic knowledge to 
clear social science of vague guessings and imaginings 
and to give it a body of positive doctrines. Philosophy 
revealed to them the basic principle that, in *he last resort, 
the world is not governed by Ideas, but, on the con- 
trary, the Ideas by the material world. They agreed 
that the proper forms of government and social institu- 
tions are not to be looked for in the inner recesses of the 
mind, but must be found through the investigation into 
the material conditions of a given period. The material? 
for socialist investigations are supplied by tht ex«*t:nf 
capitalist society with its political economy as *■!•' <.•*•! 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY If$ 

pable body whch consumes and produces concrete com- 
modities. 

In his " Capital," Marx dissected that body and ex- 
posed clearly how our social misery is the necessary 
result of an economic system whose plentiful produc- 
tion by social labor stands in glaring contradiction to its 
mode of private usurpation. The small number of em- 
ployers and their set receive as interest, rent, dividend, 
etc., the whole profit, while the workmen receive a wage, 
a kind of lubricant to keep the social machinery going. 
Marx was the first to recognize that, on the whole, 
human welfare does not depend on the enlightened 
statesman, but on the productivity of social labor. He 
recognized that the productive forces and the efficiency 
of society are by the nature of things impelled to ex- 
pand, that this expansion led us from barbarism to 
civilization, that the progress of economic productivity 
must necessarily lead us out of the glaring contradic- 
tions of civilization to the socialist state, to communist 
liberty, equality and fraternity. He recognized — and 
this recognition is the bed-rock of social science — that 
human salvation depends on material work and not on 
spiritualist moonshine. Henceforward we look for sal- 
vation not to religious, political and judicial enlighten- 
ment, but we see it organically growing out of the de- 
velopment of social economy. Science or education can- 
not bring it ; productive labor must do it, which, through 
science and education, can be made more productive. 

To which does the primacy belong; to mechanical 
work, or to mental speculation ? That's the question. At 
the first sight it might appear to be a scholastic conun- 
drum; yet, for the purpose of gaining a clear mental 
vision, it is of vital importance to solve it. The question 
is, indeed, an old one; who is right, the idealist or the 



\?6 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

materialist; but now the question has been so far cleared 
up that there can be no doubt as to the answer. We, 
of course, are materialists and thus acknowledge the 
material factors to have the primacy. Our opponents 
brand us, therefore, as enemies of culture. In reality 
we are only opponents of those dreamers who divorce 
scientific training from material work, making out of 
the former something supernatural which transcends 
all laws of mechanics. Science and education are in our 
eyes very valuable means, but means only, while the 
productivity of labor is the higher end. It is in the 
first instance the necessity for an ever increasing product- 
ivity of labor which forms the real impulse of scientific 
investigation and progress. In the second instance, of 
course, science reacts most beneficially on the method 
of labor. 

Yet the question as to where the primacy belongs 
has a more comprehensive meaning. It involves the 
cardinal problem, is the world " created " by some mon- 
strous, transcendental schemer, or is our scheming, 
though no doubt of considerable importance to us, quite 
a secondary attribute of the monstrous every-day world; 
we want to know which takes the precedence: thought 
or being, speculative theology or inductive science. Men 
are, and have a right to be, proud of their intellect, but 
it is puerile to give to a thing, which appears to them of 
primary importance, the primacy of the world. Idealists 
we call those who exaggerate, idolize the worth of human 
understanding, turning it into a religious or metaphysical 
hanky-panky. This school is on the decrease, its last sur- 
vivals are those who have long ago given up all religious 
superstitions, but somehow stick to the " belief " that 
conceptions of freedom, justice, beauty, etc., are shaping 
human destiny. To be sure, there is a certain truth in 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 1 77 

that; but in the first instance it is the material world 
which forms the substance of our conceptions, which de- 
termines what is meant by freedom, justice, etc. It is, 
as we have said before, of vital importance that we 
should be clear about that, for on it depends the method 
of giving our conceptions the proper meaning. Indeed, 
the question as to which is primary, mind or matter, con- 
tains also the problem as to the right way to justice 
and truth. 

Impelled by material necessity, Socialists look for the 
salvation of humanity. Philosophic thought based on 
facts has given us the guide. We find salvation not in 
idealistic shuffling, but in the material production. If 
the nature of things demands that we should get the 
maximum of result in the minimum of time, then we 
must work as bourgeois society does : with colossal ma- 
chinery and for a large public. The small workshop and 
the small holding must go. The great capitals shall 
flourish. That's the work of our liberals, and they have 
done it so well, that our Empire, our " free " institutions, 
our parliamentary talking shop, our party discussions 
about free trade and protection, our no-popery-struggles 
and other Bismarckian tricks are no more able to mas- 
ter it. 

The productivity of labor has become so prodigious 
that all the legal and economic forms have become inade- 
quate. The result is a series of crises with its usual 
symptoms: financial panics, bank failures, shutting up 
of factories, and unemployment in the ranks of the work- 
ing class. Why? Because the productive forces have 
outgrown the miserable relation between capital and 
labor. Under such conditions the minority are able to 
live in luxury, while the majority are deprived of the 
necessaries of life. But the number of spendthrifts are 



I78 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

too small and the stock is so embarrassingly great that 
capital cannot be profitably employed. Business is at a 
standstill, and there is no demand for goods. The only 
way out of this calamity is participation of the masses 
in the consumption; the wages must be increased and 
labor time reduced. But the well-fed capitalist, though 
in danger of suffocating in his own fat, is too narrow- 
minded to pay the producer of his wealth, the worker, 
well and to keep him in steady employment. Our Lib- 
erals refuse even a liberal lubricant for human labor- 
power. 

However, circumstances are stronger than the selfish 
will of the bourgeois. The stock is gradually sold, busi- 
ness revives, the old cycle of fraudulent booming begins 
again and the wages go up. What a strange, paradoxical 
thing this bourgeois world is: the more plentiful the 
supply the greater the misery. One should think men 
live on bread. But no. Let the soil yield thrice as much, 
as long as you don't work an overlong day, you will 
starve. Should the goblins of the fairy tale return and do 
all our work during the night, nine-tenths of the nation 
would have either to starve or to make a revolution. In 
the past the lack of capital made thrift a virtue. The 
increase of the wealth of the nation increased also the 
means of employment and thereby the sources of life of 
the people. For, as it was said before, the people have 
not in the first instance been living on bread, but on 
labor. But now with the increased capital the productiv- 
ity has reached such a degree that there is not sufficient 
employment. Then the superfluity engenders misery. 
Not only Social-democracy, but the national economics 
demand a larger consumption, a wider market for its 
products. Even an increase of wages and a reduction 
of the labor time are no more than palliatives. As the 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY I79 

productive forces in the past needed for their fuller de- 
velopment the abolition of serfdom and of restraint of 
trade, in short, demanded the liberal bourgeois policy, 
so do they demand to-day the abolition of the capitalist 
mode of wage-labor and its substitution by the Socialist 
organization of communistic labor. 

The subjective creed breaks up into different denomi- 
nations — and the various parsons are at loggerheads. 
Objective science is unanimous ; engineers don't quarrel 
about principles of mechanics. The theoretical unanim- 
ity of Social-democracy, which we mentioned before, pro- 
ceeds from the fact that we don't look for salvation in 
subjective schemes, but we see it growing as a sort of 
organic product out of the inevitable course of actual 
development. All we have to do is to facilitate its 
birth. The irresistible evolutionary process, which 
formed the planets, and hardened molten matter into 
crystals, and brought forth in succession plants, ani- 
mals and men, is also tending irresistibly towards a ra- 
tional application of labor and towards an uninterrupted 
development of the productive forces. It is imperative 
that production be rationally managed under all cir- 
cumstances. In all periods of civilization, no matter how 
greatly they differed from one another, it was essential 
— and such is the logic of things — to achieve the maxi- 
mum of results with the minimum of effort. This instinct 
produced by our physical constitution and need, is the 
universal, the primary cause and the foundation of all so- 
called higher, spiritual developments and progressive 
movements. The unfolding of the productive forces is 
the point of departure, the formative factor which builds 
up states, determines forms of governments, creates par- 
ties, and clears up and perfects the notions of liberty and 
justice. The productive forces, having been impeded in 



l8o PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

their development by guild regulations, broke those 
medieval fetters, and created the capitalist system which, 
in its turn, is rapidly becoming a hindrance to the further 
development of production. Therefore it is necessary to 
allow the people to take their historically-due part in the 
consumption and to extend the demand for goods. The 
old system must go in order to bring morality, liberty, 
equality and fraternity to a more perfect state. Forward! 
is our watchword, whether we like it or not. 

The hope of Social-Democracy is based on the organic 
necessity of progress. We do not depend on the good 
will of any man. Our principle is organic, our philoso- 
phy materialistic, but our materialism is richer in es- 
sence and more positive than any of its predecessors. It 
absorbed the Idea, the antagonism of matter, it mastered 
the domain of Reason, and overcame the antagonism be- 
tween the mechanical and spiritual view of life. The 
spirit of negation is with us at the same time positive, 
our element is dialectical. " Once my work on Economics 
finished," wrote Marx to me privately, " I shall write a 
Dialectics. The laws of Dialectics have been formulated 
by Hegel, though in mystical form. What we have to do 
is to strip it of that form." Being afraid it might be 
long before Marx could undertake such a work, and hav- 
ing since my youth independently thought a good deal 
on that subject, I shall try to throw some light on dia- 
lectical philosophy. It is in my opinion the central 
sun from whom light goes forth to illuminate not only 
Political Economy, but the whole course of human devel- 
opment, and it will finally, I expect, penetrate to the 
" final cause " of all science. 

The comrades know that I am not an academician, but 
a simple tanner who learned Philosophy by himself. To 
its exposition I can but devote my hours of leisure. I 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY l8l 

shall therefore publish my articles at shorter or longer 
intervals, whereby it will be my endeavor rather to 
make each article readable for itself than to write a book 
with chapters depending upon each other. And not at- 
taching much importance to the learned phraseology, it 
will be easier for me to avoid unessential matter and 
unnecessary flourishes which only tend to obscure the 
subject. On the other hand, I must ask the reader to 
bear in mind that the art of popular and easy exposition 
has its limits. To be sure, what one thinks out clearly, 
one can express clearly. But that truth is relative. With- 
out some preliminary knowledge of a subject it is im- 
possible to talk about it. The peasant is made fun of 
on the sea ; he knows nothing of hawsers, square-rigs and 
sails, and the sailor cannot speak of his business to him. 
Neither could I enter into a philosophic discussion without 
taking some preliminaries as granted, else I could not 
help falling into platitudes which would neither serve my 
purpose nor satisfy my taste. Any reader who, in the 
course of my articles, might complain about obscure writ- 
ing, would therefore do well to search first for light 
within himself. 

II. 

Like my sermons, which were preached with the inten- 
tion of desecrating the pulpit, my exposition of Philos- 
ophy has the intention of degrading that high mistress 
which, as Ludwig Feuerbach stated, is the devotee and 
sister of Theology. Social-democracy will get those old 
spinsters out of the way. As far back as 1844 Frederick 
Engels spoke in the preface to his " Condition of the 
Working Gass in England'' of the end Feuerbach put 
to all philosophy. But Feuerbach was so intensely occu- 
pied with the theological devotee that he had very little 



l82 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

time and mental energy left to join issue with the other 
sister, the philosophical one. His final solution of phil- 
osophy is more implicit than explicit. Yet this disciple 
of Hegel proves indirectly the truth of Marx's word: 
" The true laws of Dialectics are to be found in Hegel, 
though only in a mystical form." Feuerbach and Marx, 
both Hegelians, arrived at the same result by the same 
method which Feuerbach made use of in his analysis 
of religion, and Marx in his analysis of social economy. 

This historic course proves that our social-democratic 
anti-philosophy is the legitimate descendant of Philoso- 
phy. Owing to this descent we may place it right next 
to that of our academicians and overtopping them by one 
length, we may ask them: What do you still want? 
And when it comes to the subject-matter itself and its 
proofs, we are so sure of our case that we safely may 
look from up high down on these learned gentlemen. 
For us there is no need to appeal to Aristotle or Kant, 
because we deal with a living thing which is patent to 
all unprejudiced and unbiased minds. Just as the proof 
of scientific laws is to be found in the experiment, so 
are our arguments in conformity with fact which is the 
basis of our anti-philosophic philosophy. Therefore, it 
is superfluous to corroborate our arguments by extracts 
from Greek, Latin or other learned authors. 

It may be somewhat puzzling to the uninitiated to find 
that, while professing the intention of disparaging philos- 
ophy, we are proud of our philosophic descent. Yet the 
contradiction is easily explained: As the alchemistic 
errors generated modern chemistry, so have the errors of 
Philosophy generated a Universal Doctrine of Knowledge 
and Science. An old man who desires to be able to start 
his life again, does not mean to repeat it, but to improve it. 
He recognizes the ways he has walked as wrong ones, 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 183 

yet he cannot withhold the seemingly contradictory ac- 
knowledgment that they brought him wisdom. The crit- 
ical attitude taken up by the old man towards his past is 
just the attitude of social-democracy towards philosophy. 
It was necessary to struggle through the wrong path in 
order to attain to the knowledge of the right one. Now, 
in order to be able to follow up the right way without 
being misled by any religious or philosophical maze, it is 
necessary to study the most mistaken of all mistaken 
ways, namely Philosophy. 

Those who take this advice literally will surely think 
it absurd. For, how could the wrong path lead to truth ? 
But the reader would do well not to stick to the letter 
but to seek the sense of it. The famous dictum : " My 
religion is no-religion " illustrates for instance that not 
always is a a, but that a turns into b. It is the peculiar 
character of the things of this world that they are not 
crystallized or fossilized, but they are in an eternal flux, 
ever changing, ever in a process of transformation, of 
rising and decaying. All reality undergoes constant 
changes, and so limitless is the movement of the world 
that every thing at every moment is not the same thing 
that it was. The language therefore is not able to do 
otherwise than to give one name to various forms or 
things. Also philosophy could not escape the universal 
law of movement and mutability, and it has undergone 
such changes that it is a great question whether, like 
modern Christianity, the new thing should retain its old 
name for reasons of expediency, or should get a new 
name to match. Social-democracy has decided against 
" religion," and I am now pleading that we decide against 
philosophy too. Only for the period of transition do we 
use the expression " Social-democratic philosophy." In 



184 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

the future we shall probably speak of dialectics or of the 
general doctrine of knowledge. 

Who are we, where do we come from, and where 
do we go to? Are men the lords and masters, the 
" crown of creation," or are they helpless creatures, sub- 
jected to wind and weather, and to trouble and toil? 
What is, what should be, our relation to the things and 
men about us? That is the great question of philosophy 
and religion. In the language of the former, the younger 
sister, that question is expressed in a more rational way. 
She does not expect the reply from supernatural, divine 
spirits, nor from ecstasy, but puts it before the sober 
intellect which exists empirically in the brain. It is 
the characteristic of philosophy that it snatched away 
this " great question " from religious sentiment and placed 
it before the organ of science, the faculty of knowledge, 
to find the solution. 

Less than of our intestines can we know, without special 
study, of that mysterious thing which as force of thinking 
dwells in our head. Primitive wisdom used it as people 
use their stomach, without scientifically inquiring into 
its construction. Having, however, reached the point 
when men consciously set before the intellect the great 
question about existence, they gradually began to inquire 
into the intellect itself, and the critique of reason or the 
theory of cognition became the great question. 

It is well known that the object of the medieval school- 
men was to support the religious dogmas by rational ar- 
guments. They did something that they didn't intend 
to do: they put reason above religion; they practically 
made reason the supreme being. Something like it oc- 
curred to Philosophy. She proposed to solve the great 
question of general existence scientifically, but not know- 
ing how to take it in hand, she turned it upside down, 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 185 

and the scientific solution of the process of thinking, 
the theory of cognition, became to her the real and funda- 
mental question. The most remarkable philosophical 
works, especially the most recent, prove, though uncon- 
scious to their authors, that change of procedure. Even 
the title of the principal works, from Bacon's " Organon " 
to Hegel's " Logic " and Schopenhauer's " Quadruple 
Root of the Proposition of the Adequate Reason " indi- 
cate at once the situation. 

The past great philosophers, as well as their present 
small successors, could not help but acquire more or less 
of a presentiment of the fact that all the so-called 
mother of sciences brings home from her excursions 
really consists in no more than the special theory of 
cognition. Quotations by the yard could be brought to- 
gether to prove that statement, but also to prove that 
that presentiment did not arrive at clear nor consistent 
consciousness, and that the professors and lecturers of 
philosophy are quite confused with regard to the prob- 
lem, the object and the significance of philosophy. None 
of them has been able to clear his mind of the remnants 
of superstitions, of phantastic mysticism which dims their 
vision. Irrefutable evidence for this was given lately 
by Herr von Kirchmann, who in a " Philosophical lecture 
in popular language " said, according to the Volkszeitung 
of January 13, 1876, that philosophy was neither more 
nor less than the science of the highest conception of 
being and knowing. . . . With the special sciences 
she has in common the subject of their inquiry and con- 
templation, the Universe with all that is in it, and she 
uses the same means . . . those of the speculative 
thought which is striving for a higher unity. The main 
difference between the special sciences and Philosophy 
consists particularly in the method, for the latter proceeds 



l86 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

from no given premises whatsoever, but from a purely 
spirit-born principle as a starting point. Of her useful- 
ness Kirchmann didn't wish to speak, but of her sig- 
nificance for the great spiritual domains of life, of 
humanity in particular, for religion, state, family, ethics; 
for neither the courts of justice nor the police, but 
Philosophy alone was able to protect those great insti- 
tutions which were attacked with as much boldness as 
cynicism. 

There you have the old devotee made young. 

Her name is " Science of all the highest conceptions of 
Being and Knowing." That is her name in common par- 
lance. But I should like to see that common sense that 
could make sense out of that common parlance. " The 
highest conception of Being " deals perhaps with the 
conception of the highest fixed stars, or is there still 
anywhere a higher " Being " left ? But I take things 
too materially; we must remember we are not talking 
astronomy, but Philosophy, or " Science of the highest 
conceptions of Knowing." How can that be materialized ; 
what positive sense can we derive from that phrase? 

Philosophy " has in common with the special sciences 
the object of their inquiry: the Universe with all that 
is in it, and uses the same means to her work, namely 
the thought." But in what does the difference, the dis- 
tinction of Philosophy, consist? Kirchmann says in the 
method. Granted that Philosophy and natural science 
have the same object of inquiry and the same instrument, 
but a different way of handling. Now, what is the result 
of that difference? The results of natural science are 
known. But what has Philosophy to show ? Kirchmann 
tells us the secret: She protects religion, state, family 
and morality. Philosophy is not a science, but a safe^ 
guard against Social-democracy. Then there is no won* 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 187 

der that Social-democrats have got their own Philosophy. 
One must not think that Kirchmann was an excep- 
tion, and was no real philosopher. On the contrary, he 
is a man of great reputation and speaks quite in harmony 
with the Faculty. Especially the dictum about " pro- 
ceeding from no given premises whatsoever," bears the 
hall-mark of the official Philosophy. The " special 
sciences," as well as common sense, get their knowledge 
through the intellect, from the material world. They 
make their researches with open eyes and ears, and what 
can be seen and heard the Philosophy calls " given prem- 
ises." In her extravagant conceit which seeks the " eter- 
nal treasure," she looks upon the " appearances *' of the 
world as upon rust-corrupted and moth-eaten things. 
It is true that it is generally asserted that she is based 
on all accessible results of the different sciences, but this 
is only a concession which she is compelled to make — 
an inconsistency quite in keeping with the general philo- 
sophic confusion. She speaks thus with the left corner 
of the mouth, while with the right one she speaks of 
" the purely spirit-born or deductive principle to start 
from," of no materially preconceived notion whatsoever, 
which she is running after without ever catching up with 
it. The whole clap-trap comes really to this : Philosophy 
is no science but the radically false way used by the mind. 
Its result is to be found in our inference that by mind 
alone no truth and no principle can be attained, and no 
life problem can be solved, but that the human faculty of 
cognition is an inductive or matter of fact dependent in- 
strument which always and everywhere presupposes ex- 
perimental material. 

This is the lesson that classical Philosophy teaches us. 
Its successors and epigoni are, for reasons easily under- 
stood, not able to grasp it. They are called upon to 



l88 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

defend religion, state, family and morality. As soon as 
they renounce such calling they cease to be philosophers 
and become Social-democrats. All those who call them- 
selves philosophers, professors, university lecturers, have, 
despite their free-thought pretensions, not yet freed 
themselves from superstitition and mysticism; they are 
all of the same kidney and must be regarded, in the 
main, from the above social-democratic point of view, 
as a compact mass of uneducated reactionaries. 

III. 

Whence do we come, whence the world, and where 
are both going to? What is the meaning of existence, 
of our sentiments and of the natural phenomena? Thus 
asks man, and man is a great questioner — that is, a 
great fool. As the proverb has it, one fool can ask 
more questions than ten wise men can answer. Yet that 
question is the cardinal question which has been and will 
be put by all men at all times. Foolish is only the form 
in which the question was put first by religion and then 
by the progressists, also called philosophers. They ques- 
tioned in a hazy, general way and — " only the fool waits 
for reply." 

A reply, a clear, rational and positive reply, can only 
be expected when we specialize after the manner of the 
" separate " sciences. We can only get at the whole by 
means of its parts ; the Universe can only be understood 
by climbing up, as it were, its particular forms; we can 
only reach the general through the special. One must 
first ask, where do I personally come from ? Whence my 
father and grandfather? What is the eye? What is the 
ear? What function have the liver or the kidneys to 
perform? To such questions science replies in a definite 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 189 

% 

and exhaustive manner. Botany deals with trees, shrubs 
and herbs. Astronomy with stars. The " great ques- 
tion " thus split up, specialized and reasonably formu- 
lated can be reasonably and scientifically answered. If, 
however, such reply does not satisfy the inquisitive stu- 
dent, if there still remains something obscure and unex- 
plained, we have none the less this advantage over re- 
ligion and philosophy, that we know the method by which 
we may proceed with our questioning and searching for 
a reply, and we need not foolishly wait, believe, hope and 
speculate. 

Thus, the " method " is pointed out to us to be the 
distinguishing mark between Philosophy and the special 
branches of science. Now, the speculative method of 
Philosophy is nothing but a stupid questioning and grop- 
ing in hazy generalities. The philosopher, having no ma- 
terial to work upon, tries to evolve his speculative wis- 
dom from his head like the spider its web from its hind- 
parts! Nay, the philosopher goes even farther than that, 
he refuses all material and given premises. His philo- 
sophic fabrics have thus less of a real connection than the 
cobwebs of the spider. 

We greatly underestimate the bad effects of this abuse 
of method if we assume that it does no harm to practical 
life because it is locked up in those learned works which 
only few people care for. Those learned books are but 
the most palpable collection of a wide-spread poison with 
which humanity has been infected from the beginning, 
and from which it is still suffering. An instructive ex- 
ample was given lately by the learned Professor Bieder- 
mann in Leipsic in his controversy with the workingmen. 
He wanted the Socialists " to give him, instead of vague 
and indefinite suggestions, a clear picture of how the 
future society must be organized and according to their 



190 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

demands shall be built up; especially as to its practical 
consequences." 

Before giving Biedermann a rational answer it would 
be, before all, necessary to teach him how to put a ques- 
tion rationally. He is not acquainted with the theory or 
the science of cognition. Therefore he fails completely 
to recognize our ways. We are not idealists who dream 
about the conditions of a future society " as they must 
be and ought to be." When we are trying to think about 
the future society we first proceed from the materials at 
hand. We think as materialists. God Almighty had the 
Universe in his head before he made it; his ideas were 
sovereign and had no need to take notice of realities. 
This superstition of the sovereignty of the Idea is still 
rooted in the heads of the philosophers ; from it proceeds 
that demand that we should first project an elaborate pic- 
ture in all its details of the future society, before attack- 
ing and " destroying " the present. The old Socialists, 
Fourier, Cabet, etc., committed that mistake and we are 
therefore told to take an example from them. Herr 
Biedermann fails to understand us, and our ways and 
our cause. We don't deal with the future in the way the 
speculative philosophers do; we deal with it as prac- 
tical men. We don't build castles in the air and don't 
count the chickens before they are hatched. It is surely 
foolish to go into business without any forethought and 
plan, but it is still more foolish and quite after the man- 
ner of the fantastic enthusiasts not to reserve to one- 
self liberty of action with regard to the special condi- 
tions as soon as they are at hand — it is like a person 
who intends to deal in cotton prints and is quite in a 
hurry to project its stellular and flowery figures which 
might please the customers while he knows neither his 
customers nor their taste. We have surely a general con- 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY I9I 

ception of the constitution of future society, but we leave 
its details to the times and circumstances when that con- 
ception will have to be realized. Our opponents are 
undoubtedly entitled to demand from us a clear state- 
ment of principle, but they cannot reasonably demand the 
particulars beforehand. These must be reserved to the 
Socialist legislators who in their time will have to frame 
bills for the legislative bodies. And history bears out this 
statement : What leader of the bourgeoisie, when light- 
ing against feudalism, would have been able to describe 
all those different and multifarious institutions of bour- 
geois society, as lawyers, notaries, mortgages, bills of ex- 
change, shares, police and a hundred other things which 
capitalism has brought in its train? The leaders of the 
bourgeois movement of freedom of trade and commerce, 
didn't trouble themselves prematurely with particular 
projects; they simply demanded from their aristocratic 
oppressors " the Rights of Man," and they left meanwhile 
the question concerning particulars unanswered. They 
reserved to themselves liberty of action to meet events as 
circumstances required. 

Take care of the principles and the details will take 
care of themselves; time and circumstances will bring 
them out with unfailing certainty. Thus acted the lead- 
ers of the bourgeoisie. They refused to weave without 
material thread. And what all practical men of the 
past have done instinctively, we Social-democrats are 
doing with a clear consciousness given to us by the scien- 
tific method of cognition. 

We, too, demand the restoration of our human rights, 
and demand our socially due portion of the products of 
labor. This wish and will of ours is no idle speculation, 
but the natural outcome of present material wants. And 
so is the communist economy quite in harmony with the 



192 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

nature of the present social system; it must come; its 
materials are being produced and multiplied daily. The 
capitalists are the real silk-worms. As soon as their silk in 
the shape of accumulated productive means is spun by the 
wageworkers, we shall know how to take it in hand and 
weave it. The premature question about the future 
When, Where and How need not trouble us, it is indeed 
an idle " philosophic " speculation. 

Our platform demands from society, by means of the 
general duty to work, the satisfaction of all reasonable 
human needs. Our opponents want us to elaborate 
clearly the " practical consequences " of that idea. They 
don't like our negative and critical attitude. We should 
build up and show " how it could be done " — of course, 
not in a serious, not in a palpable and practical way, but 
on paper, by means of harmless theories and ideal de- 
scriptions. They fail to recognize that our method is not 
purely ideological. In our real work we use our brains 
after the manner of science, and not of idle speculators. 
Who wants to build must lay the axe unto the roots of 
the existing trees, and, before all, bring down the tallest 
and mightiest. But this radical cutting work we must 
not do. We should construct the future society in spirit 
only, in theory. And yet they want us to do this theoret- 
ical work in an exact and scientific way. Well, let us 
first critically assort the material on hand. However, the 
" negation " of the unfit is inseparably connected with 
the construction of the better. Criticism of the present 
is the indispensable condition of " improvement." 

That work on a small scale is not profitable and that 
private property on a large scale exploits the workmen, 
is an empirical fact; it is won experimentally by induc- 
tion and did not fall into our heads from the nebulous 
region of hazy generalities. From that fact we deduce, 



i 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY I93 

as a " practical conclusion, " the demand for co-operative 
work on a rational and communal scale. 

Since Adam Smith, and even earlier, it is acknowledged 
that labor, when applied to nature which is obviously 
nobody's property, is the creator of all capital and rent 
and profit. That labor is not carried out in a private 
way, but that it is divided among the members of so- 
ciety, is as much a truism as the phrase of the " division 
of labor." That the division of labor as practiced to-day, 
is not carried out in a systematic manner, but that it is 
more a matter of chance which produces a glut in some 
articles and scarcity in other articles of the market, more- 
over, that the division of the produce defies all justice 
and humanity, are bare facts which do not admit of any 
doubt. From all that we draw the " practical conclu- 
sion," that it is in the interest of the community to abolish 
private property of the soil, and to transfer all the means 
of production, created by labor, into the possession of the 
community, which will share out the duties and the 
rights, the labor and the produce of labor, in an equitable 
and democratic way among all its members, according to 
social needs and irrespective of individual whims. 

The special question as to the time, means and method 
of the transformation, whether it should be done by 
means of a secret treaty with Bismarck, or by a petition 
to Parliament, or by a barricade fight in Paris, or by fe- 
male suffrage in England — all such considerations are ex- 
travagant, untimely and foolish. We bide our time and 
the material which must be submitted to our understand- 
ing before we can rationally think the matter out. Our 
cause is getting clearer every day, and the people are 
daily becoming more enlightened. 

Constant propaganda, the removal of prejudices of the 
public, untiring criticism, will effect much more than all 



194 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

speculation about the future state of society. Its gen- 
eral outline is given in an unmistakable manner by the 
present actual nature of things. The determination of 
its special forms and details must be left to the enquiries 
of future times. 

The earth is wide, the sun warm, the soil fertile and 
the arms of the people are now strong enough to satisfy 
all reasonable needs of the masses, be they three times 
as numerous as at present. But men like Biedermann 
are in doubt if we have enough brains to be able to divide 
fairly the plentiful products of labor. He is especially 
anxious to know " whether all members will have the 
same claim to a share in the produce," that is, whether 
all workingmen will have only rye bread for breakfast, or 
whether professional work will be rewarded with an 
extra roll of white flour. I am not used to think much of 
my personal dignity, but such question I think unworthy 
of a Social-democratic philosopher, because its solution 
rests with the social needs of the future community. 

Biedermann speaks of " all partners of a labor 
product." But rightly conceived, there is only one part- 
ner, the working people ; and only one product, the work- 
ing people's product. Only from this social point of 
view is it possible to conceive of a just distribution, while 
the conception of different partners with different rights 
and privileges to their different products leads only to 
confusion and serves only those who want to fish in 
troubled waters. It is not good for man to be alone, says 
the Bible. It is likewise not good that he should work 
alone. The individual as well as the small societies 
should join the whole. Looked at from the standpoint of 
the whole the solution of the problem of the future so- 
ciety is clear enough, and from this general principle the 
" practical consequences " will follow in the right time 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY I95 

and with the help of inductive enquiry quite rationally. 

But what about forced labor — " the limitation of one's 
liberty does not agree with the ideal state." Well, should 
we evolve the conceptions of liberty and ideal in a fan- 
tastic-speculative way out of the pure reason as the 
German professors do, then, of course, they would not 
agree with one another. We, however, do not seek in 
metaphysics for freedom, neither do we look for it in the 
salvation of the soul from the prison of the body, but in 
the adequate satisfaction of our material and intellectual 
needs which are all of them perceptible and bodily felt. 
Compulsion to labor is, properly speaking, a law of Nature 
and is only experienced as a limitation of our personal 
freedom as long as there are masters over us, who de- 
prive us of the produce of our labor. Does the well- 
paid official consider his prescribed service as a " limita- 
tion of his personal freedom ? " 

No doubt, the adequate satisfaction of all rational 
needs through society, that is, the social-democratic or- 
ganization of economics, is a big problem. Such prob- 
lems are not solved by any individual personality, but by 
history, by social evolution. And it is puerile to set them 
before any person, no matter how ingenious, for solu- 
tion. We go to work in a practical manner, and the 
first thing is to organize the workingmen, teach them 
how to defend their own interests and to overcome their 
powerful and numerous opponents, at first symbolically, 
by logical arguments ; and if they prove themselves im- 
pervious to all logic and persist in their actions against 
all morality that is born and bound by the facts of social 
necessity, and the analogous order of things, then with 
the mailed fist. 

Yet, we need not fear that it will come to that. We 
gain daily in numbers, we gain in power and in prestige. 



I96 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

As soon as the demoralized rulers will see the signs of 
the time and come to know our power they will court us 
and make friends. Those people are not the barbarians 
they would like to appear. 

And now I must apologize to my readers for having 
occupied their time more with Biedermann than with 
Philosophy; they belong, however, insofar to the same 
category as they are both to be informed that we must 
not speculate in hazy generalities, but that we must 
inquire in a definite, precise and special manner into 
the material at hand in order to arrive at truth. 



IV. 

In the foregoing chapters we have represented Philoso- 
phy as the descendant of Religion and like it, though 
somewhat more respectable, as a fantastic speculator. 
To "solve the riddle of existence" — is the subject- 
matter of those two madcaps. 

The philosophers give their subject-matter various 
pompous titles. We have already seen that Herr von 
Kirchmann calls it " the science of the highest concep- 
tions of existence and knowledge." The famous Kant 
defines it as " God, Freedom and Immortality." In more 
recent times Diihring defined it as " the development of 
the highest form of consciousness of the. world and life " 
(Kursus der Philosophic von Dr. E. Diihring, Leipzig, 
1875, p. 2). " Highest form of consciousness " is scien- 
tific knowledge, and the " evolution " thereof is performed 
by researches. According to that we ought to define 
Philosophy as the scientific exploration of the world and 
life. 

But if one speaks in such a common-sense way the 
faculty of Philosophy loses its halo, moreover it becomes 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY I97 

quite superfluous, for such an investigation is carried on 
successfully by the special branches of science. It seems 
that Diihring felt the uselessness of his philosophic guild, 
for he ascribes to it also the function of " practical activ- 
ity." Philosophy has thus not only the task to conceive 
world and life in a scientific manner, but to demonstrate 
that conception through the character and actions of its 
adherents. That way leads to Social-Democracy. Hav- 
ing advanced so far, the philosopher may, perhaps, get a 
deeper insight into things and do away with Philosophy 
altogether. To be sure no man can do without some 
conception of world and life, but that of Philosophy is of 
a kind which is utterly useless. Its wisdom is an inter- 
mediate stage between religion and science. The crea- 
tion story of the Holy Books is too childish for the 
philosopher, and the airy, fact-removed and purely mind- 
born philosophical sommersaults are too fantastic for 
science. We said before the method is the distinguishing 
feature between religion, philosophy and science. All 
three look for wisdom. The method of religion is to look 
for wisdom on the Mount Sinai behind clouds or among 
ghosts. Philosophy applies itself to the human mind, but 
as long as the mind itself is befogged by religious mists, 
it asks and functions in a perverted manner, that is, with- 
out real premises, in a speculative way or in hazy gen- 
eralities. The method of exact science operates with the 
material of the perceptible world of phenomena. As soon 
as we learn to know that method as the only rational 
one of the intellect, all fantasms are at an end. 

If this disquisition happens to come under the eye of 
a professional philosopher he will surely sneer at it, and 
if he condescends to reply to it he will try to explain that 
the men of the special sciences are uncritical materialists 
who accept the perceptible world of experience without 



I98 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

further examination into its truth. And as to his operat- 
ing without any real premises he will refer you to the 
many pranks and delusions of the senses which lead us 
often into errors. Therefore he asks: What is truth 
and how do we arrive at it? 

Right he is. Truth is a great question. It is, especially 
for Social-Democrats, an interesting question. In the 
domain of natural science all ghost-seeing has been re- 
moved by a rational method. But in social life, where 
we have to deal with masters and servants, with labor 
and its produce, with right, duty, law, morality and order, 
there the parson and the professor of Philosophy are still 
regarded as authorities and each of them has his special 
method to mask truth. Religion and Philosophy, once 
harmless errors, have now been turned into crafty tricks 
to bamboozle the people and to serve the interests of 
reaction. 

From the lesson given in the preceeding article by 
Professor Biedermann we have learned that it is futile 
to put any question in an indefinite and hazy manner. 
In this respect Philosophy has put itself in opposition 
to sound common sense. For it does not seek, like the 
special branches of science, for definite empirical truths, 
but it seeks, like religion, for an extraordinary sort of 
truth, for an absolute, unreal and exaggerated one. What 
everybody thinks to be true, what we see, hear, feel, taste 
and smell, in short, our bodily sensations, do not com- 
mend themselves to Philosophy as sufficiently true. Nat- 
ural phenomena are in its eyes only appearances or sem- 
blances, and she refuses to have anything to do with 
them. That Philosophy treats Nature with disdain, it 
dare not admit, because natural science has gained in the 
last hundred years a reputation which cannot be gain- 
said. It is none the less certain that Philosophy seeks 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY I99 

for a truth which is not to be found in Nature. Philo- 
sophic truth that can nowhere be traced must surely have 
an aroma of its own, and belong to a species totally dif- 
ferent from the natural. It is just that the philosopher 
labors under religious delusions and wants to go beyond 
all natural phenomena and looks behind this world of 
phenomena for another world of truth by which the 
first could be explained — because of all that, I say, he 
has taken refuge in a method without any really given 
premises, which tries to weave thoughts into definite 
materials, or, in other words, blunders about in hazy gen- 
eralities. Descartes is supposed to have discovered a tiny 
bit of that transcendental truth ; it is at least that bit on 
which Philosophy has been living ever since. The par- 
son's truth, the passive belief, which was then current, 
did not satisfy the philosopher. He began to make en- 
quiries with the doubt which he exercised to such a de- 
gree that he doubted everything which is visible and 
audible. But he noticed that one thing was certain to 
him, viz., the bodily sensation of his own doubt. He, 
therefore, put forward the proposition: Cogito, ergo 
sum (I am thinking, therefore do I exist). Since then 
it has been impossible for his successors to rid themselves 
of their exaggerated doubtfulness and of their quests 
after exaggerated truth. 

Far be it from me to refuse to recognize the historic 
importance and the keenness of mind of that famous scep- 
tic. He was right ; the bodily sensation of existence, my 
consciousness, my thinking, feeling, in short, " my soul " 
is, as the parson says, beyond doubt. Yet I must add, that 
I am ascribing to Descartes much more than he really 
achieved. It is like this, the philosopher had two souls, 
a traditionally religious and a scientific one. His philoso- 
phy has a mixture of both. Religion deluded him into 



200 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

believing that the perceptible world was unreal, whilst 
his scientific cross-current tried to imbue him with the 
conviction that the opposite was true. With the unreal- 
ity, with the doubt he started out and with the state- 
ment of his bodily sensation of existence he proved the 
opposite. Yet the scientific cross-current did not succeed 
in gaining a full and final victory. It is only the impar- 
tial enquirer who, when repeating the experiment of 
Descartes, finds out that it is the bodily sensation which 
gives us certainty of the existence of the process of 
thought when ideas and doubts are moving about in the 
head. The philosopher turned the thing upside down, he 
wanted to prove the bodily existence of the abstract 
thought — he assumed to be able to prove scientifically 
the exaggerated truth of a religious or philosophic soul, 
while in reality he has only confirmed the common truth 
that bodily sensation exists. The sensation of profane 
existence Descartes mistook for a proof of the existence 
of a higher being. His misfortune is the general mis- 
fortune of all philosophy: to be purely idealistic and 
spellbound. 

I am introducing the readers of the Volksstaat to a 
subject-matter which they might consider too subtle. But 
we must make proselytes also among the scholars. So 
we must prove that we are well informed about " the 
last causes " of all things, and that our cause has its 
foundations laid in the deepest depths. We must make 
short work also of the philosophic bombast. Pure ideal- 
ists! A clear-headed workingman, when coming to 
know them, will hardly think it possible that there are 
such foolish fellows. Idealists in the proper sense of 
the word are all aspiring men. All the more so the 
Social-Democrats. Our aim is a grand ideal. But the 
idealists in the philosophic sense are an irresponsible lot. 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 201 

They assert that everything we see, hear, feel, etc., that 
the whole world around us does not exist, but are simply 
flashes of our mind. They assert that our intellect is 
the only truth, everything else is an idea, a phantasma- 
gory, a mirage, an appearance in the purely ideological 
sense of the word. Everything which we perceive of the 
external world, they say, is not an objective truth, not a 
real thing, but only a subjective drift of our intellect. 
And when common sense refuses to accept such an as- 
sumption they will in a plausible manner demonstrate 
and tell you that although you see every day the sun 
rising in the East and setting in the West, yet science 
teaches quite differently and you must have recourse to 
science in order that you may be able to use your senses 
intelligently. 

Also a blind hen, says the proverb, finds sometimes a 
good grain. Such a blind hen is philosophic idealism. 
That the things which we see, hear or feel are not 
objects pure and simple, is its good grain. Also scientific 
physiology comes more and more to the conclusion that 
the various-colored objects which our eyes see, are sen- 
sations of our optic nerve, that all the crude, fine and 
heavy which we feel, are sensations of heavy, fine and 
crude. Between our subjective sensations and the ob- 
jective things no absolute line can be drawn. The world 
is our perceptible world, that is, as perceived by our 
senses. Without eyes the objects would have no aspect 
whatsoever, and without a nose they would have nothing 
of an odor. " There is no noise without ears to hear it, 
and no heat and cold without a skin to feel it," said 
Professor W. Preyer in Jena in one of his latest articles 
on the " Limits of sense perception." The things of the 
world do not exist " in themselves," but they possess their 
properties only by their relation to each other. It is in 



202 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

relation with sunlight and our optic nerve that the forest 
appears green. With another light and with a different 
optic nerve they might appear blue or red. Water is only 
liquid in relation to a certain temperature, in a low tem- 
perature water becomes hard and solid, in a high temper- 
ature it turns into gas; it generally runs downhill, but 
when in touch with a loaf of sugar it runs upwards. It 
has no properties or existence in itself, but gets them by 
relation to other things. As with the water so it is with 
all other things. Everything is but the quality or predi- 
cate of Nature which is nowhere to be found in a tran- 
scendental objectivity or Truth, but is always round us in 
fleeting and form-changing appearances. 

The questions as to how the world would look if there 
were no eyes, no sun, no space, no temperature or intel- 
lect or sensation, are idle, and fools may investigate 
them. No doubt, in science as well as in life we are 
allowed to differentiate, to distinguish and to classify 
ad infinitum, but in doing that we must never forget that 
all things form a single unity and a connected whole. 
The world is a world of senses, and our senses and our 
intellect are worldly. This is by no means a " limitation " 
to man, but to those distracted ideologists who want to 
go beyond Nature. When we demonstrate that the im- 
mortal soul of the parson or the undoubted intellect of 
the philosopher are of the same common Nature as are 
all the other phenomena of the world, then we have 
proved that the other phenomena are as real and true as 
the undoubted intellect of Descartes. We not only be- 
lieve, assume, think that our sensation has existence, but 
we feel it truly and really. And conversely : The whole 
truth and reality is based on feeling, on bodily sensa- 
tion. Soul and body, or subject and object as the old 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 203 

joke is called by its modern name, are of the same 
earthly, perceptible, empirical stuff. 

" Life is a dream," said the ancients. Now the philoso- 
phers come with the latest : " The world is our Idea." 
Yes, but this Idea is not an absolute or transcendental 
Truth. It is quite sufficient when we distinguish the 
great, general and true dream in daylight from the more 
or less unconscious dreaming over night and in the dark, 
since in so doing we finish with pure Idealism which is 
the weakest and most shortcoming part of Philosophy. 

To base truth not on the word of God and not on tra- 
ditional principles, but our principles on bodily sensations 
— that is the cardinal point of social-democratic 
philosophy. 

V. 

" God formed the human body out of a clod of clay 
and breathed into it an immortal soul." Since that time 
we have the dualism or the two-world theory. The one, 
the bodily, the material world is dirt, and the other, the 
spiritual or mental ghost-world is God's breath. That 
little story has been secularized by Philosophy, that is, 
adapted to the Zeitgeist. The visible, audible and tangi- 
ble, the bodily reality is still regarded as dirty clay, while 
to the thinking mind is given the kingdom of a tran- 
scendental Truth, Beauty and Freedom. Just as the 
world has a bad name in the Bible, so also in Philosophy. 
Among all phenomena or objects which Nature offers, 
Philosophy finds only one object worthy of attention, 
namely, the mind, the old breath of God; and that only 
because it appears to those queer heads as a transcen- 
dental, unnatural, metaphysical thing. It is surely per- 
mitted to the inquirer to limit himself to one object, but 
he must not deify it, nor tear it from its interconnection, 



204 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

nor worship it in an exaggerated manner. The philoscy 
pher who approaches the human mind soberly and make* 
it the aim of his inquiries, like any other object of the 
many objects in the world, ceases to be a philosopher, that 
is, one of those who want to study the riddle of existence 
in a general, hazy, manner. He becomes a specialist and 
the special science of the theory of cognition becomes his 
special branch of inquiry. 

Because Philosophy regarded all special objects of the 
world as dirty and material, nothing remained to it but 
the hazy speculation in indefinite, misty generalities. The 
philosophers possess, however, along with the religious 
soul, an exact Reason with a scientific tendency, a Reason 
which wants to achieve something definite. They are, 
therefore, compelled to look out for a definite object, for 
a scientific specialty. The logic of reality has driven 
Philosophy to become and to undertake something which 
it didn't want to become or to undertake. The reason- 
able desire for success in connection with the traditional 
worship of the divine breath gave thus to Philosophy 
as its object of inquiry the matter-of-fact Intellect. 

That the common spirit of the human head is their 
true spirit, the philosophers hardly know; this must be 
made clear to them by Social-Democrats. The philoso- 
phers, as a rule university professors, have an interest 
in preserving for their professional intellect the character 
of the divine spark. All the more must it be the interest 
of the working men to know that this very intellect is a 
common natural object. Behind the question as to 
whether there is in our head a sublime idealistic spirit or 
a common human reason, we find the great social ques- 
tion hidden as to whether might and right are to-day on 
the side of the privileged class or on the side of the 
common people. 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 20$ 

Struggle of the good against evil is the eternal essence 
of history. Sometimes the struggle reaches an acute 
stage, as for instance to-day when the productive working 
class is struggling against the ruling parasite class. In 
this struggle a good many splinters are thrown about. 
Everything is affected by it ; even the language is going to 
pieces. The " highest " conceptions, such as Truth, Free- 
dom, Culture, are being corrupted. " Philosophy " and 
a seats of learning " must be put in inverted commas in 
order to mark the equivocal character which they have 
assumed. Professors have become generals in the army 
of evil. On the right wing are in command Treitschke, 
in the centre von Siebel, on the left wing Jiirgen Bona 
Meyer, doctor and professor of Philosophy in Bonn. 
The latter delivered lately in the Berlin " Gegenwart," a 
logomachy against the " Unbelief of our Times," against 
the religion of Social-Democracy. He leads the crack 
regiments of his "science," the labored points of philo- 
sophic Idealism, into battle, and he comes just in time 
to be captured with his war materials in order to enable 
us to illustrate by them to the students of social-demo- 
cratic Philosophy our subject-matter. 

In the foregoing chapter we have already mentioned 
the feat of Descartes which the professors of higher 
magics or Philosophy are in the habit of producing before 
the public in order to dupe them. They try to demon- 
strate the breath of God as truth. To be sure that name 
fell into disrepute, and enlightened, liberal-minded people 
do not talk any more of the immortal soul. Instead of 
that they talk in a sober, materialist way of consciousness, 
faculty of thought and ideas. But to represent it as hav- 
ing a common non-transcendental nature, no enlightened 
man, even of the liberal class, would dare to do. It is 
only the Social agitator who represents it like that. To 



206 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Jiirgen Bona Meyer and Co., to the doctors of Philos- 
ophy, it is a foregone conclusion, a dogma, that the hu- 
man mind is of a transcendental nature. Let us have a 
look at that dogma. 

We feel in ourselves the bodily existence of thinking 
Reason, and with the same sensation we feel outside our- 
selves the clods of clay, the trees and shrubs. And that 
which we feel inside, and that which we feel outside our- 
selves are not far removed from each other. Both be- 
long to the category of perceptible phenomena, of empiric 
material, and both become known to us through sensa- 
tion. How to distinguish subjective from objective sen- 
sations, the inside from the outside, ioo real dollars from 
ioo imaginary ones — of that we shall speak upon occa- 
sion. Here it is only necessary to grasp that the inner 
thought, like the inner pain, exists as objectively as the 
outside world exists subjectively in relation to our organs 
of sensation. The relation between subject and object, 
spirit and Nature, thought and existence, which has puz- 
zled so many people, becomes clear when we gain the 
understanding that the opposition is but a relative one, 
that these opposites differ only in degrees. 

It is the democratic equality of all things in Nature, 
of the body and the soul, which cannot enter the heads 
of the " philosophers/' The said Meyer with his science 
without any given premises starts really from the sup- 
position that the breath of God or the immortal soul or 
the philosophic intellect is of a higher and more direct 
Truth than any other children of the common mother 
Nature. As long as he does not relinquish that idea it is 
easy to prove that the " external world " is of mere clay, 
and that its existence does not rest on science, but on 
belief. 

Let Jiirgen speak for himself : " The man who is a 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 20? 

non-believer on principle must again and again be re- 
ferred to the truth proved philosophically that all our 
knowledge rests in the last resort on some sort of belief. 
Even the materialist accepts the existence of the 
world as a matter of belief. He does not possess a 
direct knowledge of it; he is only sure of the idea 
of the world which arises in his mind ; he believes that 
there is something which corresponds with his idea, 
that the represented world is such as he imagines it to 
be; he does believe in the existence of an external 
world on the evidence of his mind. His belief in the ex- 
ternal world is primarily a belief in his own mind. And 
why does he believe that the imagined world will be such 
as the human mind imagines it or must imagine it ? — Be- 
cause it would be irrational to assume that the human 
mind which has the impulse and the power to imagine an 
external world, would necessarily be deceived in the exer- 
cise of its power. . . . Thus the belief in the senses 
is in the last resort a belief in the fitness of our mind. 
The preconceived notion of the fitness of the world forms 
thus the last basis of the materialistic conception." 

There you have the feat of Descartes in a new and 
cheaper edition. " Only the idea is undoubtedly certain, ,, 
but also this certainty is uncertain, for he speaks of " the 
belief in one's own mind." Meyer's belief is " philo- 
sophically demonstrated," yet he knows that he knows 
nothing, that all is merely belief. He is modest with re- 
gard to knowledge and science, but overconfident with 
regard to belief and religion. Science and belief are 
used by him in a confused manner, maybe that he does 
not attach any importance to either of them. 

Now it is " philosophically demonstrated " that all our 
knowledge is done for. For the benefit of the reader 
I may add that the guild of Philosophers at their last 



2o8 Philosophical essays 

general meeting in all solemnity carried a resolution to 
purge our language from the word " science/' and to 
put belief in its stead. All knowledge is henceforth 
merely a believing. All knowledge is now at an end. 
Sure enough, Jurgen speaks of " direct certainty " and 
" philosophically proved truth ;" but that is simply an un- 
conscious relapse into the bad manners of old. Or, may- 
be, he uses the words like the theologians who regard 
the mother of Jesus with her eternal virginity, or the talk- 
ing ass of Balaam as a " demonstrated truth " and " direct 
certainty." The Professor, however, corrects himself, 
for he says explicitly : the belief in the perceptible world 
is a belief in one's own mind. Thus everything, spirit 
and Nature, rests on belief. But, alas, he is surely 
wrong in trying to impose upon us dialectic-materialists 
the resolution of his guild. For us the resolution is not 
binding. We remain true to the use of the language in 
reserving to ourselves knowledge, and in surrendering 
all mere believing to the parsons and Doctors of Philos- 
ophy. 

No doubt " all our knowledge " rests on subjectivity. 
The wall yonder, against which we could split our heads 
and find it, therefore, impenetrable, may be passable like 
mere air for goblins, angels, demons and other ghosts, 
or for such people who deny the whole dirty clay of the 
perceptible world — but what of that? Why bother 
about a world which we can't perceive? Maybe, that 
what people call fog and wind are really, purely or " in 
themselves/' heavenly flutes and counterbasses. But for 
all that we can have nothing to do with that transcen- 
dental moonshine. Social-democratic materialists deal 
only with things which man perceives empirically. To 
those things also belongs his own faculty of thinking. 
The empirical we call truth, and only that do we make 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 209 

an object of science. If Professor Jurgen Bona Meyer 
and the pure Idealists want to introduce a perverted 
nomenclature, to give science the name of belief and 
priestcraft the name of science, then it becomes evident 
to a good many people that the official Philosophy has 
turned from a devotee to a servile " menial of the Lord." 

Since Kant made the critique of Reason a specialty 
of philosophic research we know that the five senses are 
not alone sufficient to gain experience, but that the in- 
tellect must co-operate to that end. The critique of 
Reason has also taught us that the divine spark can only 
become active in the material domain, that is, in the em- 
pirical world ; that Reason without the help of the senses 
has no sense or understanding, and is therefore a thing 
of common relationship with all other things. Yet the 
great philosopher found it too difficult to forget the story 
of the divinely inspired clod of clay so as to liberate the 
mind from its ghostly effect and to consummate the 
emancipation of science from religion. The conception 
of the disdainful, clay-like matter and of the " thing in 
itself " or the transcendental truth enveloped all philoso- 
phers more or less in a purely idealistic delusion which 
solely rests on the belief in the metaphysical character of 
the human mind. 

That weak spot of our great critic is now taken ad- 
vantage of by our Prussian and Imperial philosophers in 
order to make out of it a new religious idol, and a 
wretched one to boot. " The idealistic belief in God," 
says J. B. Meyer in the above mentioned article, " is 
surely not knowledge and will never become such, but it 
is likewise sure that the materialist's unbelief is not 
knowledge, but a materialist belief which can no more 
become knowledge than the idealistic belief." The meta- 
physical craving of our philosopher would be quite satis- 



210 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

fied if the Social-Democrats would but confess that they 
understand as little of the question, or that they are as 
much in the dark about their basic principles as Meyer 
is about his. He wouldn't perhaps mind atheism; it is 
the Social-Democratic self-consciousness which he can't 
stand — the self-consciousness which turns even against 
the thin, consumptive belief of the Prussian and Im- 
perial philosophers. " All religious belief," continues 
Meyer, " begins with some exaggeration, with some fal- 
lacy, and needs, therefore, constant cutting of its false 
excrescences. . . . The progress of belief consists 
just in this, that through the increase of knowledge, be- 
lief rids itself of superstition." But he forgets to in- 
form us about that true philosophic miracle of a religion 
free from superstition which is to remain despite the 
" constant cuttings." He goes on angrily : " The pop- 
ular champions of the materialistic and atheistic unbelief 
are with few exceptions not leaders of science, but mis- 
guided braggarts of knowledge." Well, dear Jiirgen, 
they do not at all claim the leadership of general science, 
but are limiting themselves to the study of a specialty, 
namely, to the theory of cognition, in order to be able 
to send the parsons of Philosophy about their business. 

VI. 

The philosophic apologies of Jiirgen Bona Meyer, 
quoted in the last chapter, are the last make-shifts of re- 
ligion. And it isn't he alone who plays this tune. He 
has with him in the literature of the day a whole com- 
pany of musicians who are in the same boat. All of 
them repeat the same reactionary refrain : " Back to 
Kant." The question has therefore an importance which 
goes beyond the little person of General Jiirgen. They 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 211 

do not want to go back to Kant because this great thinker 
has made short work of the story of the immortal soul — 
that he has undoubtedly done; but they would like to 
return to him, because he, on the other hand, has left in 
his system a narrow entrance through which a little meta- 
physics can be smuggled back into it — that he has un- 
doubtedly done, too. 

Idolatry, Religion and Philosophy are three slightly 
different kinds of the same thing, which is called meta- 
physics or cracked Truth. I apologize for the use of the 
latter adjective, but an unequivocal characterization de- 
mands a strong terminology. The cracked Truth has 
played a great part in the history of the world. Idol- 
atry, Religion and Philosophy have been evolved from 
one another in the course of time ; and now, in the time 
of Social-Democracy, we have arrived at the point when 
Philosophy, the " last Mohican " of the metaphysical 
tribe, must be transformed into rational Physics. 

It is clear : all perverted wisdom rests on the perverted 
use of our intellect. And nobody has been more suc- 
cessfully and courageously engaged in the inquiry of 
the intellect and in the foundation of the theory of cogni- 
tion than Immanuel Kant. Still, there is an essential 
difference between him and his successors of to-day. In 
the great historic struggle against superstition he stood 
on the side of progress ; he put his genius into the service 
of the revolutionary development of science, while our 
Prussian philosophers serve reactionary politics. 

As long as the philosophers were sometimes in danger 
of being sentenced to take poison, like Socrates, or of 
ending their life on the stake, like Giordano Bruno, of 
being expelled by the Prussians and threatened with the 
gallows, like Wolf, or of being placed under Police super- 
vision, like Kant and Fichte — in short, as long as 



212 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Philosophy was a dangerous occupation, it was also an 
honest endeavor to struggle through the mists of meta- 
physics to Reason, to rational thinking. Now, however, 
when philosophers have given up the struggle and are 
sounding retreat, it is time for Social-Democracy to learn 
with what kind of " science " and with what sort of 
" liberal " fellows they have to deal. 

The push with which Kant has thrown metaphysics 
out of the Temple, and the narrow back door which he 
left open are clearly indicated in a few sentences in the 
preface of the second edition to his " Critique of Pure 
Reason." Not having the volume at hand, I quote from 
memory. They are as follows: Our knowledge is lim- 
ited to the experienced things, to the phenomena; what 
they are in themselves we are not able to know. Yet, 
the things must be something in themselves, else we 
would arrive at the inconsistent proposition, that appear- 
ance exists without the something which appears. 

The great thinker argued seemingly quite logically, 
and yet his argument is altogether faulty. On his fal- 
lacy rests the metaphysical remains which Philosophy 
still drags along. 

It cannot be denied that where there are appearances 
there is also something which appears. But how would 
it be if that something were the appearance itself, when 
appearances simply appear? There would be nothing 
illogical or irrational in that, if subject and predicate 
were everywhere in Nature of the same kind. Why 
should the something which appears be of a quality 
totally different from the appearance? Why can the 
things " for us " and the things " in themselves " — why 
can appearance and truth not be of the same empirical 
material, of the same Nature? 

Reply: Because the superstition about the metaphys- 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 213 

ical world — because the belief in the dirty clay, which 
is evident, and the belief in an imperceptible exaggerated 
or divine truth, which must somewhere dwell in it, has 
not been cleared completely out of Kant's mind. The 
syllogism: Where there are appearances which we see, 
hear and feel, there must also be concealed in them some- 
thing quite different, a so-called higher or divine Truth 
which cannot be seen, heard or felt — this syllogism is a 
fallacy despite Kant. 

The scholastic squabble about God, Freedom and Im- 
mortality was repulsive to that thinker. Therefore he 
put the intellect to the test and asked, whether something 
cracked, or metaphysics, could be possible as a science. 
No, was his reply after a wonderfully clear and thorough 
inquiry. No, our instrument of cognition depends on 
experience as well as our experience on that instrument. 
In other words, our mind cannot produce science but 
with the help of perceptible material, and science must 
and can have nothing to do with the "other world." 
Only in its conscious connection with the materialist ex- 
perience may the intellect become operative, and all ques- 
tioning into hazy generalities can lead only to confusion 
and failure. 

But the Konigsberg Professor had, as Heine relates, a 
valet, a common fellow of the people, by the name of 
Lampe, to whom, it is said, air castles were an emotional 
necessity. The Professor took pity on him and argued : 
whereas the world of experience is closely connected with 
the intellect, we have really nothing else but mental ex- 
periences, that is, mental appearances or flashes. Em- 
pirical material things are no real truths, but apparitions 
in the transcendental sense of the word, cobwebs of the 
mind or something like it. The real things " in them- 
selves," the metaphysical truths, are beyond our experi- 



214 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

ence, and must therefore be believed, in consequence of 
the well-known argument: Where there is appearance 
there must be something (metaphysical) which appears. 

Thus was the belief, thus was the cracked truth 
snatched from the fire of rational inquiry, which was very 
welcome, not only to the valet Lampe, but also to the 
German Professors in the " Kulturkampf," for " pop- 
ular enlightment " and against the hated and radically 
unbelieving Social-Democrats. Immanuel Kant was 
henceforth the proper man ; he helped them to attain the 
requisite, though not scientific, balance of mental attitude. 

The theologians are now no more in need of telling us 
how the old Lord Zebaoth looks, in how many choirs the 
angels are divided, and in how many regiments the devils, 
or whether the commanders are called Gabriel, Michael 
or Lucifer — for Kant's philosophy has proved once for 
all that nothing can be known about them, and that, 
therefore, the parson must shut up. 

But when the Social-Democrats appear on the scene 
and rejoice over the good news that superstition has dis- 
appeared and that the cracked hopes have ceased troub- 
ling, and that the earthly salvation has begun, then — of 
course, things look different, then they will prove to you 
by the same Kant that, though we cannot see, hear or 
perceive the metaphysical truth which dwells behind the 
natural phenomena, we must believe in it. Thus we can- 
not get rid of belief, if not in Rome, and if not in the 
Bible, then in the " Back to Kant," Jurgen Bona Meyer 
and his ilk. 

The Social-Democrats are convinced that the clerical 
Jesuits are less dangerous than the " Liberal " ones. 
Of all parties the party of the middle-roaders is the 
most wretched. It uses the terms Enlightenment and 
Democracy as a false label in order to offer to the peo- 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 21 5 

pie adulterated goods and to discredit the genuine ones. 
They, of course, offer their goods on their best knowledge 
and conscience. And we do believe that they know little ; 
but the worst of it is that they don't want to know and 
don't want to learn. The superstition is with them not 
as much a matter of brains as of instinct. They are 
alarmed at ghost-freed thought, for they feel instinctively 
that it is dangerous to their interests. And it is that 
instinctive fear which paralyzes them and renders them 
unfit for courageous and consistent research. 

Under such circumstances it would be a mistake to 
treat them as equals, to meet them in a friendly spirit and 
to try to bring them back on the right path. They are 
by no means stray lambs, but bitter foes. Since Kant a 
century has gone; Hegel and Feuerbach have come and 
gone, and before all, the capitalist system has fully devel- 
oped which exploits the people and, finally, when no 
profits can be made out of them, throws them pitilessly 
on the street and leaves them to starvation. Then the 
people open their innocent eyes. All ideology is driven 
out of them, and thus we need no tender pedagogues, nor 
Moses and the Prophets to educate the masses. Our 
pupils, the wage-earners, possess all qualifications neces- 
sary to gain an insight into the Social-Democratic Phi- 
losophy, which regards the natural phenomena as the 
material for theoretical or scientific truth, the empirical 
and materialist, or, if you like, also subjective truth, 
which, however, must be clearly distinguished from the 
extravagant or cracked truth of metaphysics. 

Just as in politics we see the nation dividing itself 
into two camps, on one side the wage-earners and on the 
other the capitalists, corresponding with the economic 
development which is thinning the ranks of the middle 
classes and leaving only two classes: the Have and the 



2l6 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Have-not, so is science divided in two general divisions : 
into metaphysicians there and into physicists or material- 
ists here. The intermediate members and conciliating 
quacks with their different appellations : Spiritualists, 
Sensualists, Realists, etc., etc., fall underway into the 
current. We are steering full steam ahead to a definite 
and clear outline of things. Pure Idealists are those 
who sound the retreat, and dialectic Materialists must be 
the appellation of all those who strive for the liberation 
of the human mind from all metaphysical magics. In 
order that names and definitions may not confuse us we 
must steadily keep in mind that the general want of clear- 
ness has not allowed yet of establishing a distinct termi- 
nology in this field. 

In comparing the two parties with solid and liquid 
matter we find pulpiness as the intermediate stage. Such 
indistinctness is the general nature of all things in th'e 
world. It is only the faculty of cognition, or science, 
which clears them and puts them asunder, just. as it has 
distinguished heat from cold by inventing a thermometer 
and agreed to regard the freezing point as the fixed limit 
where the indistinct temperature is divided into two dif- 
ferent classes. The interest of Social-Democracy de- 
mands that we should apply the same process to Philos- 
ophy, that we divide the general species of thought into 
two classes: into purely idealistic, religious, emotional 
twaddle and into a sober, inductive or materialist method 
of thinking. 

VII. 

This series of lectures, published in the Volksstaat, 
have been temporarily interrupted. I shall not speak of 
the reasons which led to the interruptions, but let me 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 217 

simply say that I am going to continue them, or rather 
start them anew. 

Dialectically speaking, the continuation of the old is 
at the same time a fresh start, especially in our subject- 
matter, for the social-democratic conception of the world 
is a complete system which, in the form of an inverted 
pyramid, moves, like a whipping-top, on its point. And 
as the whipping-top spins only in connection with its 
broad head and with its level plane and with its string 
which sets it in motion, so can the point of our new, sys- 
tematic conception of the world not be represented in 
an isolated manner in itself, but only in the closest con- 
nection with the manifold questions which agitate the 
world. This subject-matter, " the fixed pole in the cease- 
less motion of events," needs thus continuous variations 
in order to go on with the old continuation by a fresh 

start. 

****** 

Though we Social-Democrats are atheists without re- 
ligion, we are not irreligious, that is, the gulf between us 
and the religions is great and deep, but has, like other 
gulfs, its bridge. It is my intention to lead the social- 
democratic comrades to that bridge and to show them 
from there the difference between the wilderness in which 
the believers are wandering about and the promised land 
of serenity and truth. 

The supreme commandment of the Christian is : Thou 
shalt love God beyond everything and thy neighbor as 
thyself. Well, God beyond everything. But who is 
God? He is the beginning and the end, the Creator of 
Heaven and earth. We don't believe in his existence, 
and yet we find something reasonable in the command 
which orders us to love him beyond everything. 

Those who contemplate the Eternal, Omnipresent and 



2l8 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Most Honored cannot fail to perceive that He is in reality 
nothing else but the personification of the Universe; no 
mortal can claim nowadays to have seen the All-Father 
and to have spoken to him. Yet the atheists, too, must 
acknowledge that reason-gifted man is, despite his intel- 
lect and his science, a subordinate creature, dependent on 
sun and winds, earth, fire, air and water. That means 
that our mind, destined though it is to rule over matter, 
is none the less a limited ruler. 

With our intellect we can rule in a formal manner 
only. On a small scale we are able to control the 
changes and movements of matter according to our will, 
but taken as a whole, as the substance of things, cosmic 
matter is superior to all mental capabilities. Science is 
able to transform mechanical energy into heat, electricity, 
light, chemical energy, etc., and it may succeed in trans- 
forming all phenomena of matter and of force into one 
another and to reduce all its forms to one element; but 
all this granted, science can only change the form, while 
the essence remains eternal, imperishable and indestruct- 
ible, a given material. The intellect can get out of mat- 
ter the secret of its physical changes, but they are after 
all material ways which the proud intellect can only fol- 
low but not command. Sound thinking must always be 
conscious of the fact that it is, together with the " im- 
mortal soul " and the knowledge-proud reason, only a 
subordinate piece of the Universe, though our present 
" philosophers " are still occupied with the jugglery of 
transforming the real world into an " idea " of man. 
The religious commandment: Thou shalt love God be- 
yond everything, means in plain social-democratic lan- 
guage: Thou shalt love and honor the material world, 
the corporeal Nature or the perceptible existence as the 
final cause of all things, as the Existence without a begin- 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 2IO, 

ning and an end, which was, is and will be from eternity 
to eternity. 

As it is well known and as we have repeatedly stated, 
the philosophers are a more or less progressive offshoot 
of the theologians and doctors of divinity. All of them 
are, consciously or unconsciously, " one reactionary 
mass," that is, their common characteristics are to be 
found in the fact that they regard the Universe as the 
product of the Intellect, while we regard the Intellect and 
all other forces, like heat, gravitation and all which is 
audible, visible and tangible, as a form or species, as a 
piece or product of the general force, which is identical 
with the omnipresent, eternal and indestructible cosmic 
matter. Language has so far treated the conception of 
force and matter rather arbitrarily. Palpable things like 
wood, stone, clay, etc., are ponderable forces, while those 
things which we cannot touch with our hands, for in- 
stance, light, heat, tunes, we call imponderable matter. 
The world of tunes constitutes the matter of the musi- 
cian. And those who dislike this generalization of the 
word " matter " may, instead of that, speak of " phe- 
nomena." Bodily, physical, perceptible, material phe- 
nomenon is the name of the general species, to which 
everything belongs, the ponderable and the imponder- 
able, body and soul. 

In order to clear ourselves of the " metaphysical crav- 
ing " it is absolutely necessary to keep in mind that al* 
differences which we may make are but the manifold 
forms or the attributes of one indivisible unity. Though 
we differentiate between the bodily and the mental forms, 
the difference is none the less but a relative one; they 
are but two kinds of one and the same existence. This 
difference is no greater than that between cat and dog, 
who, regardless of their well-known animosity, belong 



220 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

to the same class or species, namely, to that of domestic 
animals. 

Natural science in its narrower sense cannot give us the 
monistic conception of the world (that is, unity of Na- 
ture : unity of matter and mind, of the organic and inor- 
ganic, etc.) which is so eagerly looked for in our time, 
even if science succeed in proving satisfactorily the ori- 
gin of species and the evolution of the organic from the 
inorganic. Science achieves all its discoveries through 
the intellect. The visible, tangible and ponderable part 
of that organ undoubtedly belongs to the domain of nat- 
ural science; but the function, the thinking, is investi- 
gated by a separate science which some call Logic, or 
Epistemology or Dialectics. The latter department of 
science, the understanding or misunderstanding of the 
mental function, is the common ground of religion, meta- 
physics and the anti-metaphysical investigation. Here 
the bridge is to be found which leads from servile, super- 
stitious oppression to modest freedom. Also in the de- 
mocracy of epistemological freedom modesty governs, 
that is, submission to material, physical necessity. 

The inevitable religion changes in the heads of the 
philosophers into metaphysics, and in the heads of clear 
thinkers into the undeniable necessity of a monistic con- 
ception of the world. The existing matter-force, also 
called Universe or Existence, becomes mystified in the 
heads of the theologians and philosophers, because they 
do not understand that matter and mind are of the same 
species, and because they pervert the relation in which 
they stand to each other. Materialism is, like Political 
Economy, a scientific, a historical result. Just as we 
distinguish between modern and Utopian socialism, so 
also between modern and 18th century materialism. With 
the latter we have only this in common that we assume 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 221 

matter as the premise, as the cause of the idea. Cosmic 
matter is to us the substance, while mind is the incidence ; 
the empirical phenomenon is to us the species, and the 
intellect but a variety or form of it, while all religious 
and philosophic idealists assume the idea to be the pri- 
mary, the causative and the substantive force. 

What we see, hear, feel, etc., say the idealists, are the 
intellectual phenomena, insofar as the intellect must exist 
where things are to be seen, heard and felt. Good and 
well, say their opponents, but with it there is also matter. 
Where there is intellect, thinking, consciousness and 
knowledge, there must be an object, too, a matter which 
is perceived, and that is the main thing. What is the 
main thing, matter or mind? That is the old question 
which separates idealists from materialists. But that 
question, too, is but a piece of hazy phraseology. The 
real difference between the two camps is that the one 
turns the Universe into witchery, while the other camp 
will have nothing to do with that. All natural phenom- 
ena being only perceptible with the aid of our intellect, 
all our perceptions are intellectual phenomena. Quite 
so. But in that sum total is included a special sensation, 
a phenomenon, which especially deserves the adjective 
" intellectual," and that is human reason, mind or the 
faculty of forming ideas, while the other phenomena are 
collectively called material. Therefore it really comes to 
this: matter, force and intellect are of the same origin. 
It is indeed a miserable logomachy to quarrel about the 
adjectives " intellectual " and " material." The main 
thing is to know whether all things are of the same spe- 
cies or whether the Universe is to be divided in a super- 
natural, mysterious witchery and a natural, ordinary clay. 

Those who desire to gain a clear notion about that 
must not be satisfied with simply following the example 



222 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

of the old materialist who reduced everything to ponder- 
able atoms. Cosmic matter has not only gravity, but 
aroma, light and sound — and why not also intelligence ? 
If the smellible, visible and audible is more spiritual than 
the ponderable — if the comparative is natural, why not 
also the superlative? Gravity cannot be seen nor light 
be smelled, nor the intellect be touched, but we may 
perceive everything which exists. Don't we perceive 
our thoughts as physically as we feel pain, light, 
heat or stones? The prejudice that ponderable objects 
are more perceptible than the phenomena which are com- 
municated to us through hearing or feeling in general 
misled the old materialists to their atomistic speculations, 
misled them to make the ponderable the final cause of 
things. The conception of matter must be given a more 
comprehensive meaning. To it belong all phenomena 
of reality, also our force of thinking. To the idealists 
who call all natural phenomena " Ideas " or " intellectual 
phenomena " we say that the natural phenomena are by 
no means "things in themselves," but objects of our 
sensations. Since also the particular phenomenon called 
subjective feeling, soul or consciousness is an object of 
sensation, there is no use here splitting up things into sub- 
jective and objective. The objective thing can only be 
perceived subjectively, and vice versa. Both exist and 
both are of the same kind ; body and soul are of the same 
empirical material. An impartial observer can have no 
doubt that spiritual material, or, to be more exact, that 
the phenomenon Of our force of thinking is a part of the 
world and not the reverse. The whole governs the part, 
cosmic matter the mind, at least in the main, though it is 
true that mind reacts on cosmic matter. And it is in 
this sense that I said we must love and honor the mate- 



SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 223 

rial world as the supreme being, as the cause of all 
causes, as the creator of heaven and earth. 

That confession does not in the least prevent us from 
regarding the intellect as the primus inter pares, as the 
first object of all the objects in the world. 

When Social-Democrats call themselves materialists, 
they only want to emphasize their view that they refuse 
to acknowledge anything which pretends to lie beyond 
human cognition in a metaphysical way. All witchery 
must go overboard. 

But — so do our philosophical ravens croak — what 
about "the limits of natural cognition?" Has not the 
learned Du-Bois-Reymond proved conclusively that the 
haughty intellect has its limits? And has not our late 
socialist friend, F. A. Lange, the expert historian of Ma- 
terialism, agreed to all that and expressly declared that 
all our knowledge could not penetrate the essence of 
things, and that, after all, something mystical and incon- 
ceivable must remain unsolved forever? 

That theory of the limited understanding of common 
humanity is a fool's theory, which we shall still further 
discuss. 



THE LIMITS OF COGNITION. 

(VOR WARTS, 1877) 

An anonymous letter touching the above subject, 
written evidently by an expert, has recently been re- 
ceived by the Vorwarts, which in an unbiased manner 
attempts to show that Philosophy and Social-Democracy 
are two things apart and that, therefore, one may very 
well belong to our party without adhering to the 
"Social-Democratic Philosophy." Hence it is concluded 
that the central organ of the party was wrong in allow- 
ing philosophic discussion to become a party matter. 

The editor of the Vorwarts has been good enough to 
show me that letter as it referred to my articles. Though 
the author has given clearly to understand that he had 
no wish to provoke by his protest any public contro- 
versy, since, as he maintains, newspaper controversies 
did not admit of a thorough treatment of the subject, 
nevertheless I hope he will not find it indiscreet if his 
objections are used here for the purpose of elucidating 
a question which both to him and to myself and, to judge 
from the general interest displayed at present with re- 
gard to it, appears to be of great importance to our whole 
generation. And as regards thoroughness, it seems to 
me that voluminous books are no better qualified for it 
than newspaper articles. On the contrary, there has been 
of late so much longwinded twaddle that a great portion 
of the public is losing all taste for the discussion of such 
matters. 

224 



THE LIMITS OF COGNITION 22$ 

First of all I should like to contradict the statement 
that Philosophy and Social-Democracy were two things 
apart which had nothing between them in common. Quite 
true, one may be an efficient member of the party and at 
the same time a "critical philosopher," or even a Chris- 
tian. The human soul is such a queer thing that it can 
easily find some sort of conciliation between the veriest 
contradictions. And not only in things philosophical 
and religious, but also in things economical, a great 
measure of heresy is permitted. We must in practice 
be tolerant to the extreme, and surely no Social-Demo- 
crat would ever think of putting any Party member into 
the straight jacket of uniformity. Nevertheless, theoreti- 
cal uniformity must be demanded of all who devote them- 
selves to scientific investigation. Theoretical uniformity, 
systematic homogeneity is the consummation to be de- 
sired as well as the advantage of all science. That 
Social-Democracy is scientific and science is social-demo- 
cratic will, I hope, be granted by my esteemed opponent. 
Of course, there are many branches of science which 
bear less on the socialistic aspirations to emancipate en- 
slaved humanity. But the philosophical question — the 
question whether there is beyond and above the world 
anything metaphysical, " anything higher/' which it 
would be too monstrous for our intellect to attempt to 
conceive, or which is beyond the human understanding 
to explain — this special question of Philosophy about 
the " Limits of Cognition " bears very closely upon the 
slavery of the people. 

Social-Democracy does not seek to establish eternal 
laws, permanent institutions or unchangeable forms; it 
seeks in general the salvation of mankind. The indis- 
pensable means toward attaining that object is mental 
«nh'ghtenme*fct. The question whether the instrument of 



226 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

cognition is a narrow makeshift, that is an inferior om. k 
whether scientific research supplies us with true ideas, 
with truth in its highest form and last instance, or mere- 
ly with poor " substitutes " which have above them the 
Inconceivable — this problem of the Theory of Cognition 
is eminently a Socialist problem. 

All the ruling powers which have exploited the people 
have to this very day appealed for justification to a 
higher destiny, to the grace of God, to the holy ointment, 
to the metaphysical incense. And if they also referred to 
enlightenment, religious freedom, political progress and 
critical philosophy, they knew very well that without 
" something higher," something inconceivable, something 
metaphysical, be it even a mere " moral world," the 
reins will break which keep the people straight and the 
ruling classes in wealth and dignity. 

But let there be no misunderstanding. Not that the 
Social-Democracy are against the moral world. We, 
too, desire to arrange the world morally; but we desire 
this arrangement to emanate from the many below, and 
not from the few above, that is, we desire to arrange it 
ourselves. We, therefore, need no chimeras, no " limits 
of cognition " to effect and to keep up such an arrange- 
ment. It is, on the contrary, preeminently the business 
of Social-Democracy to make it clear to the perverted 
world that the individual intellect is a poor instrument 
in comparison with the fathomless problem of science, so 
that the individual must circumscribe his efforts within 
definite limits ; but that, on the other hand, the faculty of 
cognition of the human race is as full of possibilities, as 
limitless, as fathomless as the problem which nature sets 
before it for solution. The doctrine of mental poverty, 
the doctrine of the limited understanding of man is the 
last remnant of the religious humbug. Those who, On 



THE LIMITS OF COGNITION 227 

the basis of the Social-Democratic program, strive to 
emancipate the working class through the workers them- 
selves, must entirely divest themselves of all the foolish 
expectations and hopes and philosophical hairsplitting 
and speculation in so far as it all relates to another 
world. 

This other world is now an exploded notion with 
science and scientific circles ; there is only that portion of 
it left which deals with the " limits of cognition," and as 
long as these are supposed to exist, there is still a 
higher limitless cognition standing behind, and there is 
also the Inconceivable, and nobody who has before his 
eyes that phantom will ever arrive at a proper appreci- 
ation of, and confidence in, human energy and responsi- 
bility. 

To transform radically the present immoral world, an 
energetic consciousness of the unlimited faculty of cog- 
nition of the human mind is required. This makes it im- 
perative that we should place all talk of the possibility of 
a " higher cognition " in the same category where the 
bodies of the Saints stand who, indeed, have stomachs, 
but need no food, no drink. If another sort of cog- 
nition is possible than the one which is commonly called 
so, then, of course, flesh and blood are possible, too, 
which look, taste and are constituted like flour and 
water. In short: we ought, then, to become Catholics, 
and seek our salvation in prayer and not in active work ; 
we must then give up Social-Democracy. 

Our anonymous comrade is of a different opinion. 
He wants to take up the cudgels in behalf of something 
inconceivable, in behalf of a limited human cognition, and 
yet is not willing to stop and keep to those limits. Those 
who really believe that there is something inconceivable 
must and will keep away from it with their conception 



228 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

and not try to penetrate further and inquire, — else they 
treat the supernatural as if it were natural, and the in- 
conceivable as if it were merely not yet conceived. An 
equation like this, our opponent thinks, is merely an " ex- 
ternal" one, the contradiction only a superficial one, since 
it indicates only that the human mind, which involuntar- 
ily affects that equation, is reluctant to admit the ex- 
istence of the Inconceivable and, therefore, pronounces it 
merely to be not yet conceived. " If it did do that ; if, 
on the contrary, it were to accept that there really is 
something inconceivable, which to it is like a sealed book, 
then under such an acquiescence all incentive towards 
inquiry would be lost and there would no longer be any 
science." 

From this it follows that man has two minds: one 
which must needs have something inconceivable, and 
another which must needs inquire into it. As against 
that I hold that the time has arrived when the human 
mind must be taught that the inconceivable is not a sub- 
ject for science and that scientific inquiry has more than 
enough food in the domain of things yet to be con- 
ceived. 

" This," says our opponent, " is really nothing but the 
old controversy over again about the limits of human 
cognition, — a controversy which your (the Vorwarts) 
correspondent has presented in a way of his own with 
which I am not quite in sympathy. " Let us see, then," 
he continues, " whether our professors of Philosophy 
have really treated this point so badly as to deserve a 
curt dismissal." 

" The one who first carried out the investigation into 
the limits of cognition was Kant. However, he did not 
proceed beyond the ' Categories of Understanding/ and 
had in his ' Practical Reason ' to assume hypotheses 



THE LIMITS OF COGNITION 220, 

which gave his system a contradictory character. It was, 
however, this circumstance in his system which, al- 
though the limits of formal cognition had been defined 
sharply enough, made further progress a necessity. And 
what else was it than the endeavor to conceive the in- 
conceivable, that is to solve the inner contradiction of 
thinking ?" 

" Fichte it was who attempted the solution, etc. ,, 
" Then it was Hegel who came nearer to the incon- 
ceivable by a far greater step by demonstrating, etc. 
. . . He showed that, in order to understand the 
World-Reason, it is only necessary to understand our 
own Reason. This, it is patent, brought the Inconceiv- 
able appreciably nearer to us. And when we thus con- 
sider to what an extent those three philosophers have 
advanced our scientific understanding by attempting to 
conceive the Inconceivable we must take some care not to 
condemn the " official " Philosophy and to give her 
notice to quit." 

The reply of the Social-Democratic philosophy is as 
follows: It never thought of refusing the philosophers 
of the past what is historically due to them. On the 
contrary, it starts from the premises that Kant, Fichte 
and Hegel have transformed the Inconceivable (i. e., the 
faculty of cognition) into the Conceivable to such an 
extent that the time has at last arrived when we can 
give all metaphysics with its official philosophers notice 
to quit, — and also all those thinkers who fail to recog- 
nize this important achievement and do not cease mak- 
ing an Inconceivable of everything which is not yet con- 
ceived. The " Critique of Pure Reason," the " History 
of Science," the " Logic," or the theory of cognition has 
in its development advanced so far that now Social- 
Democracy has a clear knowledge of what is meant by to 



23O PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

know, and we may well speak with derision of those 
learned capucines who place above the knowledge of 
nature something " higher " still. 

Kant is said to have " sharply enough defined the 
limits of formal cognition/' This is precisely what we 
dispute with all our might — the point that separates 
radically the Social-Democratic philosophy from the 
official. Kant has not sharply enough defined the 
limits of formal cognition because, with his famous 
" thing in itself," he still left the belief in another, a 
higher cognition, in a superhuman monster-mind. 
Formal cognition is knowledge of Nature ! The philoso- 
phers may sigh for another sort of knowledge, but they 
are, before all, bound to give us some indication where it 
is to be found and how it is constituted. 

Of the real cognition, the one which is in daily use, 
they speak contemptuously like the ancient Christians 
spoke of the " weak flesh." The actual world is for 
them only an " appearance " and its essence a mystery. 
Long after this rotten phrase has become discredited in 
other branches of science, the fraud is still being perpe- 
trated in the theory of cognition. Nobody will have any 
other sort of tin than natural tin, why should it be dif- 
ferent with knowledge? If natural science is content 
everywhere with the phenomenon, why not with the 
phenomenology of mind ? Behind the " Limits of formal 
cognition" there always hovers the higher, unlimited 
metaphysical mind; behind the official philosopher, the 
theologian, and behind both of them, the Inconceivable. 

And when Hegel showed that, " in order to under- 
stand the mind of the world it is only necessary to under- 
stand our own mind," we declare ourselves perfectly in 
agreement. Only the Social-Democracy would correct 



THE LIMITS OF COGNITION 23I 

the mystical expression: we know only one mind, the 
human mind is the mind of the world. 

" But what is this Inconceivable ? " asks the author 
of the letter to the Vorwarts. " When we are forced to 
acknowledge that every scientific attempt to conceive it 
brings us appreciably nearer to it, are we not bound at 
the same time to believe that it will eventually become 
the Conceived? Then we should have the demand of 
your correspondent fulfilled, — not, indeed, in his way, 
but in that of official philosophy. To this, too, the official 
philosopher has his reply, namely, that " Being" as in 
a state of absolute rest, can by no means be resolved into 
the absolute movement of thinking. This dictum, says 
our opponent, defines at once the limits of knowledge, 
that is, the Inconceivable. Does it follow, then, that we 
must deny its existence, and that we must keep away 
from it? Surely not. Every scientific attempt to ap- 
proach it, to conceive it, or even to formulate the prob- 
lem of it, leads us nearer to the obscure point and throws 
new light on it, though it may never bring us to an ab- 
solutely clear vision of it. And the pursuit of this ob- 
ject is the business of philosophy in contradistinction to 
natural science which only deals with facts and explains 
phenomena." 

Phenomena ! Of course ! 

Thus the subject of philosophy, the Inconceivable, is a 
kind of a bird from which we can now and then pluck 
out a feather or two, but are unable to strip it to the skin, 
and which must forever remain inconceivable. If we ex- 
amine closely the feathers which the philosophers of the 
past have already plucked, we recognize by them the 
sort of the bird : it is the human mind. And here we are 
again at the decisive point which separates the dialectic 
Materialists from the pure Idealists: mind is to us a 



232 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

phenomenon of Nature, while Nature is to them a phe- 
nomenon of mind. If it only stopped there! But no, 
there lurks in the background the malicious intention to 
promote mind to an " entity," a thing of a higher descent 
and to reduce everything else to a platitude. 

We are, therefore, bound to call attention to the fact, 
well known as it is to the world at large, that not only 
mind, consciousness or apperception, but all things are 
" in the last resort " inconceivable. 

11 We are unable to conceive the atoms, and we cannot 
explain out of the atoms and their movement the slight- 
est phenomenon of consciousness," says Lange in his 
" History of Materialism," and another writer also says, 
" the nature of matter is absolutely inconceivable." And 
yet we continue to inquire into their nature, because of 
our need of causation or, as it is also called, " impulse 
towards research," which, in its irrepressible way, cannot 
help plucking feathers even from the Inconceivable. 

As against this we say : that which allows of being pos- 
sibly conceived is not inconceivable. Whoever wants to 
conceive what he considers inconceivable, cannot be taken 
seriously. Just as with my eye I can only perceive the 
visible, with my ear hear only the audible, so with my 
faculty of conception I can only conceive the conceivable. 
And when the Social-Democratic philosophy teaches 
that everything which exists can be perfectly conceived, 
it does not thereby deny the Inconceivable in a natural 
sense. We admit the same as the naturally invisible 
for our eyes; we only object to that double-dealing, 
shuffling " philosophical " sense which makes the Incon- 
ceivable again conceivable on a higher plane. We are 
earnest about this question, we know of no higher and 
other cognition than the ordinary human one, we know 
positively that our understanding is truly called under- 



THE LIMITS OF COGNITION 2$$ 

standing, and there can as much or little be any other 
and essentially different understanding as square circles. 
We place the intellect among the ordinary things which 
cannot change their nature without changing their 
names. 

The Social-Democratic philosophy agrees with the 
official one that " Being can by no means be resolved into 
thinking " — not even a particle of it. But neither do we 
regard it as the task of thinking to resolve Being, but 
merely to arrange, to order it formally in classes, to ex- 
plain its rules and to find its laws, — in short to arrive 
at what is called " Knowledge of Nature." Everything 
is conceivable in so far as it can be classified, everything 
is inconceivable in so far as it cannot be entirely reduced 
to thought, This we cannot, must not and have no wish 
to do, and therefore we keep away from it. But we can 
very well do the reverse — namely, to reduce thinking 
to being, i. e., to classify the faculty of thinking as one 
of the numerous modes of existence. 

My opponent appeals to the fact that Kant, Fichte and 
Hegel have come nearer to the Inconceivable by a few 
steps. But what those philosophers have grasped was 
nothing inconceivable, but merely the conceivable portion 
of the intellect or the " formal cognition/' We only go 
a little step further and conceive the intellect as totally 
a formal instrument which can only perform in the 
theory of cognition what it practises in natural science. 
With us science is a homogeneous species of which phil- 
osophy and knowledge of nature are varieties, — both ob- 
serve " given facts " or explain " phenomena." We find 
intellect to be as much empirical as matter. Thinking 
and being, subject and object exist in the domain of ex- 
perience. To characterize one of these natural objects 
as absolute rest and the other as absolute motion is, since 



234 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

natural science has reduced everything to motion, no 
more permissible. What our comrade said of the In- 
conceivable — namely, that every scientific attempt leads 
us a step nearer to the obscure point, though we can 
never gain an absolutely clear vision of it, — is also true, 
without mystification, of every object of natural science, 
of the inconceived. Also knowledge of Nature has its 
unlimited objective; even without mystic limits we ap- 
proach the obscure point ever nearer and nearer without 
ever bringing it within full vision. That means simply 
that science, like nature, has no limits. 

Granted, however, that impulse towards enquiry is in- 
herent in man, it cannot be denied that, in order to use 
this impulse rationally, one must properly understand it. 
The rational impulse towards enquiry tends to a certain 
systematic arrangement of existence, i. e., to find out the 
laws of existence. If it exhibits the tendency to go be- 
yond existence, it must go beyond itself, beyond all 
nature. With such aspirations Philosophy necessarily 
overshoots itself and falls into extravagance which it 
inherited from religion. Philosophy and religion miss 
the " final causes " of all conceivableness : namely, the 
empirical, the fact ; our thoughts should be based on 
sense-perceptions, on experiences. Those who, on the 
contrary, wish to base fact on mind or logic must under- 
stand this merely in a formal sense. The last cause why 
the stone falls or heat expands is the fact, and the law 
of gravitation and the law of expansion are abstractions 
or formal reasons. Not only can Being not be resolved 
into Thinking, but even the philosophic aspiration to do 
so is a pure-ideological overstraining. 

Just as man is possessed by the impulse to know 
everything, so he possesses also the impulse to see 
everything. Well, here is a pane of glass which is quite 



THE LIMITS OF COGNITION 235 

transparent. Yet it is not all transparent. Its specific 
gravity or degree of solidity cannot be seen; its quality 
to emit a sound can only be heard, etc. Precisely the 
same with the organ of knowledge : we are able to know 
everything completely, yet along with this everything is 
something more than knowable, and this fact that Being 
cannot be resolved into thinking can be a matter of lam- 
entation only to the fantastic dreamer. If we could know 
of any one thing absolutely everything, then knowledge 
would be all and the object nothing. Knowledge and 
nothing left to know! Light and nothing left to see! 
Then it would be like of yore when nothing was — " and 
the earth was without form, and void." 



OUR PROFESSORS ON THE LIMITS OF COG- 
NITION. 

(VoR WARTS, 1878.) 
I 

At the " Fiftieth Meeting of German Naturalists and 
Physicians," held at Munich, September, 1877, Pro- 
fessor C. V. Nageli, of Munich, took up a well known 
lecture of his Berlin colleague, Du Bois-Reymond, and de- 
livered a remarkable address on the " Limits of Scientific 
Knowledge." One is bound to admit that the Munich 
professor has, in point of truth and clearness, far sur- 
passed his Berlin colleague; still he, too, was unable to 
rise to the level of his time. 

He nearly explained the whole thing; but the small 
point which he missed at the conclusion is just the vital 
point, — the one which marks the wide gulf that divides 
physics from metaphysics, sober science from romantic 
belief. Such a lecture, proceeding as it does sharply up 
to that point, offers a welcome opportunity to show once 
more the superiority of the Social-Democratic conception 
of the world. 

Prof. Nageli treats his subject in the following man- 
ner : " Many methodical scientists who, by their exact 
mode of research, augment the stock of well based facts, 
while holding a fundamental solution inadmissible, 
answer the question as to the Limits of Knowledge of 
Nature by a simple statement of fact : ' Belief invariably 
begins where knowledge ends/ The statement that our 

236 



PROFESSORS AND LIMITS OF COGNITION 237 

belief begins where knowledge ends — the lecturer con- 
tinues — is a practical solution for certain definite pur- 
poses. Our interest is not satisfied thereby. We turn 
our special attention to the theoretical side of the prob- 
lem. We want to know whether the limits where human 
knowledge must stop are at all definable, and if so, how 
far can knowledge penetrate into the domain of Nature ; 
how much of Nature could the human mind conceive, if 
it were to occupy itself during an unlimited time — say, 
an eternity — with natural sciences and have at its com- 
mand all imaginable means of research, — in a word, 
what is the fundamental line of demarkation between the 
domain of knowledge and that of belief?" 

As is well known, his predecessor, Du Bois-Reymond, 
tried to prove that there really is such an impassable line 
of demarkation, that consequently belief will, under all 
circumstances, have a domain of its own left to it. It is 
only owing to the reservation of this little refuge for 
religious romanticism that his lecture has gained its 
seeming importance and popularity. Since that time the 
champions of the Inconceivable have not ceased singing 
Hosanna. True enough, Prof. Nageli is little edified by 
this song, but his official privileged position as a pro- 
fessor does not allow him to enter the fight in a whole- 
hearted manner. After showing his predecessor clearly 
and by all manner of means that he has misunderstood 
the nature of scientific knowledge, he concludes as fol- 
lows : " Du Bois-Reymond winds up his lecture with 
the crushing words, Ignoramus and I gnorabimus. I 
should like to conclude mine with the qualified, but 
withal, consoling expression of opinion that the fruit of 
our researches is not merely knowledge, but actual truth 
which contains within itself the germ of an almost ( !) 
infinite growth, without thereby coming nearer by the 



238 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

smallest step to omniscience. If we adopt an attitude of 
a reasonable resignation, if we, as finite and transient 
beings that we are, content ourselves with human 
knowledge instead of claiming divine cognition, then we 
may say with full confidence in ourselves and in the 
future : ' We know and we shall know/ " 

These concluding remarks contain the essence of the 
question. They also unmistakably express both the re- 
ligious and subservient consciousness of the Berlin pro- 
fessor and the tame and timid inconsistency of the 
Munich one. The religious romanticism of Du Bois- 
Reymond calls all results of scientific research " merely 
knowledge," and not " real truth." Such true cognition 
is not attainable by the poor human understanding. The 
professor literally says that " the whole of our knowledge 
of Nature is in reality not cognition, but a substitute of 
an interpretation." 

Our science, then, can only yield chicory instead of 
coffee. Our scientific interpretation may very well allow 
itself to be buried, perhaps it may rise transfigured on 
the day of judgment. And such reactionary word- 
splitting wants to dominate our universities! 

Then comes the other one, Nageli, to whom that pious 
resignation seems rather too strong. The nice distinc- 
tion between knowledge and cognition does not recom- 
mend itself to him. He is convinced that " we know 
and shall know." But observe how gently he breaks this 
news to us : " without thereby coming nearer to omni- 
science by the smallest step." He, too speaks humbly of 
" human " cognition as against that of the higher Non- 
Humanity. We must submit to a " rational " resigna- 
tion and lay no claim to "divine knowledge." Is it 
possible that so learned a professor should " resign " him- 
self monklike to divine cognition and even call such resig- 



PROFESSORS AND LIMITS OF COGNITION 239 

nation rational? All natural cognition is divine, that is, 
glorious and wonderful. When, however, our professor 
opposes to human cognition a divine one, then he pro- 
ceeds beyond the limits of Nature and lands in the same 
romanticism in which his predecessor has landed before 
him. 

II 

The Munich professor has clearly shown to his Berlin 
colleague that by not recognizing our knowledge of 
Nature as a real, true cognition, he demonstrated not the 
limits, but the inanity or absolute impossibility of scien- 
tific cognition. And, consequently, he stands at a purely 
negative point of view. According to Nageli, Du Bois- 
Reymond teaches as follows : 

1. Cognition of Nature is the reduction of a natural 
phenomenon to the mechanics of simple, indivisible 
atoms. 

2. Atoms in this sense do not exist and, consequently, 
no real cognition exists. 

3. Even if the world could be understood out of the 
mechanics of the atoms we would still be unable to under- 
stand out of these atoms apperception and consciousness. 

On this Nageli justly remarks: "Since the speaker 
does not proceed beyond mere negation, natural science 
cannot, in its lack of a proper domain, draw its limits 
either, — and if it is for ever unable to gain an insight 
even in the material phenomena, it matters little whether 
it may possibly lay claim to the spiritual domain." In 
other words, if our knowledge yields instead of coffee 
only chicory, then we only have one bad brew and noth- 
ing else. There is nothing good left which it would be 
worth while to investigate, to understand or to place 
within its proper limits. 



240 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

After one professor has thus settled the other, the 
pleasant duty remains for us to show, what, however, 
must be clear already, that the Munich professor, too, 
has landed where the other one was caught. Herr Nageli 
differs from Du Bois-Reymond in that he has so far 
broken loose that it is difficult to judge whether it was 
because his strength has failed him or on account of 
decorum, that he felt himself obliged to keep to the 
" mysterious land of presentiment/' to the " divine cog- 
nition and omniscience " and such like things which 
"surpass our human faculties." 

" As regards the faculty of the Ego to know of natural 
things, the decisive and undoubted fact is that, however 
our faculty of thinking is constituted, only the sensory 
perception offers us any knowledge of Nature. If we 
did not see and hear, did not taste, smell or touch any- 
thing we could not altogether know that something exists 
outside us, — nay, that we ourselves are corporeal." 

These are brave words. Let us adhere to them and 
see whether our professor sticks to them also. 

Our sensory perception, says our lecturer, is limited to 
the present. " We cannot in a direct way perceive what 
was in the past and what will be in the future, nor what 
is too distant in space nor what is too small or too large 
in dimension." 

Quite so. But what one man did not see yesterday 
another one will see to-morrow. Where the distances 
are too great and the dimensions too small, there we call 
to our assistance the telescope and the miscroscope. 
"Thus it is possible, theoretically speaking, for the 
human organism to get bodily impressions of all phe- 
nomena in Nature. But how does it stand in reality? 
What impressions are powerful enough to be noticeable 



PROFESSORS AND LIMITS OF COGNITION 24I 

lo us and what are insignificant enough to pass by un- 
noticed ? " 

We are not going to follow the lecturer in all his de- 
tails, but will readily acknowledge what always has to be 
acknowledged, " Our faculty to get direct perception of 
Nature through the senses is limited in two respects. 
We probably ( !) lack the perception for whole domains 
of Nature (is it for that of goblins, ghosts and the like? 
J. D.) and so far as we possess it, it merely embraces in 
time and space an insignificant portion of the whole." 
(Yes, Nature surpasses the human mind, it is an inex- 
haustible object, J. D.) " Of the constitution, proper- 
ties, history of a fixed star of the last magnitude, of the 
organic life on its obscure satellites, of the material and 
spiritual movements in those organisms — of all that we 
shall never know anything." 

Here, again, our professor goes too far. Our faculty 
of research is only limited in so far as its object, Nature, 
is unlimited. We cannot arrive at any end, simply be- 
cause there is no end. But where there is an end, there 
we may possibly arrive. No professor can tell how much 
of the fixed stars and their satellites we and our suc- 
cessors may yet find out, how infinitely deep we may yet 
penetrate into the past, into the future and into the small- 
est particles, since, as Nageli himself says, we have 
" theoretically " speaking, every possibility for that. We 
know that no explorer will ever find two mountains with- 
out a valley, no cutter will ever make a knife without a 
blade and handle, for these are all theoretical impossibili- 
ties. But what results practice will still achieve — to de- 
termine that in advance, after the spectral analysis and 
the invention of the telephone, is surely a piece of im- 
pertinence. 



242 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

III 

Inquiry never arrives at an end — neither objectively 
nor subjectively ; neither the infinity of the world, nor the 
infinity of the intellect admit of an end; that, however^ 
the intellect is but a limited portion of the world, no 
Social-Democratic materialist will ever deny. On the 
contrary, it is precisely he who scientifically conceived 
the thinking faculty as an instrument, quality, product or 
part of Nature. We are not animated to such a pre- 
sumptuous extent by mind as to ascribe to it every 
capacity and every faculty. We only wish — what our 
professor wished, but could not achieve — we only wish 
to escape from dualism. We can only acknowledge one 
solitary world — the one " of which we obtain knowledge 
through the sensory perception." We keep Nageli to his 
word, namely, where we do not see or hear or feel or 
taste or smell anything, there we can not know any- 
thing either. 

I wish to return once more in a positive manner to the 
perceptibly limited nature of human cognition. With 
this faculty we can only know; to sing, to jump and to 
do a hundred other things with it we cannot; in so far 
reason is limited. But in its own element, in cognition, 
it is unlimited, and so unlimited that it never comes to an 
end with its work. 

To go on. Everything knowable is open to it. The 
unknowable, that which is absolutely inaccessible to the 
senses, is for us non-existent ; it is also "in itself " non- 
existent insofar as we cannot even speak of it without 
drawing upon the fanciful. 

" Our senses are just organized for the needs of com- 
mon life, but not in order to satisfy our mental need, 
and to gi\e us knowledge of all phenomena of Nature. 



PROFESSORS AND LIMITS OF COGNITION 243 

. Just as we came to know something about the 
cteea ical phenomena which have their seat in every par- 
ti^ie of matter, so there may be yet other natural forces, 
other moleculer forces of motion of which we do not get 
any sensory impression, because they never unite into an 
observable sum, and therefore remain hidden from us." 

We reply : Those who have the ' mental need ' to know 
something of phenomena ' which remain hidden from us/ 
and must remain hidden according to our Nature, have 
not a mental need, but a mystical need. The electrical 
phenomena have no more been discovered by accident 
than America was. And what a strange Columbus a 
scientist must be to speak of phenomena which nobody 
ever perceived or will perceive. It is possible that 
Mephistopheles should hover about me in the form of 
an invisible rearmouse; but what I don't know leaves 
me cool and ought also to leave cool every natural 
philosopher. 

Nageli says : " The natural philosopher must well be 
aware that his inquiry is confined in all respects by finite 
limits, that on all sides he is categorically bidden to halt 
by the unknowable eternity. That this has not always 
been understood, that the infinitely great and the in- 
finitely small have been mistaken for the endless and noth- 
ing, has often led to erroneous ideas. Such are the er- 
roneous theories of the physical atoms as the infinitely 
small, and of the beginning and end of the world as the 
infinitely great" 

The consciousness of the limits of research may, 
eventually, be useful to the scientific inquirer. Still our 
professor ought not to have forgotten that rational doc- 
trine in the very same breath in which he propounded it. 
This he does when saying that " on all sides we are cate- 
gorically ordered to halt by the unknowable eternity." 



244 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

How can one know anything about this ' halt ' when it is 
unknowable? Or is Nageli, like Du Bois, perhaps, un- 
able to escape from the mere negation? Can he, too, 
only tell of the great halting-point of the ' eternal/ that 
nothing can be known about it? 

Nageli continues. "This is not to say that the scien- 
tist must not philosophise, that he must not enter the 
domain of the ideal and transcendental. But he ceases 
to be a scientist, and the use he can make of his own 
profession is to keep the two domains strictly apart, that 
he treats the one as the real domain of research and 
knowledge, and the other, freed as it is of all finite, as 
the occult domain of presentiment." 

Our good professor knows the philosophers badly if he 
thinks that they will content themselves with the * occult 
domain of presentiment/ Not only the Social-Democrat, 
but also many ' official ' philosophers, claim that although 
their domain be hidden from the Munich professor, it is 
still open to ' human understanding,' and that all ' divine 
cognition ' must be rigorously excluded from it. The 
occult domain or the metaphysical world beyond is not 
nearer Philosophy than to the other pure ideologists who 
seek each and every one to find some snug corner for 
their shrines. With science these conservative endeavors 
have nothing to do; they belong to the domain of prac- 
tice. On the other hand, there is much more that be- 
longs to the domain of exact science than those gentle- 
men are at all inclined to admit. They consider the con- 
ception of Nature in too vague a fashion. If it cannot be 
disputed that History, Economics, Politics, etc., ought to 
develop into exact sciences, nay, are already in a fair way 
to do so and have already partially done so, then Social- 
Democracy can also prove that the gulf between Phi- 
losophy and Science has already been bridged over with- 



PROFESSORS AND LIMITS OF COGNITION 245 

out the bourgeois geniuses getting the slightest wind 
of it. 

Professor Steinthal has gone in this respect further 
than his scientific colleagues. In the third edition of his 
book, " The Origin of Speech," he says : " Speaking is 
not thinking, but the means, the organ of thinking," and 
" no mind is without speech (designation) ; speech itself 
already belongs to the domain of mind." Continuing 
this train of thought we argue: Speech lends our ideas 
their true designation. What speech designates as 
Nature, truth, knowledge and tin is really and truly tin, 
knowledge, truth and Nature. Steinthal teaches us on 
this point as follows : A only equals A and never B, if 
1 equal ' is not taken in the mathematical sense of being 
equal in magnitude. But if • equal ' means equality in 
essence, then A equalling B, B must be A, and we have 
no right to call it otherwise than A. Steinthal calls this 
" the principle of research and knowledge." In other 
words unity, unity in conception and name is the first 
condition of science. All dualism is untenable. If 
divine knowledge = A, and human knowledge = B, that 
is, if both are essentially different, then we simply juggle 
",vith the word knowledge in a dualistic manner. Just as 
all mankind, in spite of the different races, make but one 
species, so necessarily is there in spite of the diverse 
kinds but one knowledge, one truth, one Nature, — the 
true Nature, the natural truth. And everything we get 
to know in heavens, on earth and in other places belongs 
to the same category. And what we do not get to know 
and of which only the parson and the professor tell us, — 
is mere jugglery, which, however, belongs to the natural 
truth, that is, true jugglery. 



246 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

IV. 

Nothing more is meant by these deductions than this : 
the world is a unity, that is, there is only one world. And 
whoever wants to pass over to another world — from 
that of experience to that of presentiment or divinity, — 
nay, whoever merely speaks of it, is either a ' crank ' or a 
scamp or a deceiver of the people. To have the right 
to stigmatise an opponent with one of these bad names 
no further proof is required than that he contradicts the 
" wants of Reason for unity." 

When Nageli tries to impose upon his colleagues at 
the meeting of scientists the belief that our intellect has, 
or, perhaps, has outside of the bounds of its own nature 
yet other, supernatural or unnatural limits, he performs 
thereby a scandalous trick, the more scandalous, in fact, 
the further he has progressed in the conception that 
Nature represents an organic whole where no gulf could 
be found. 

" Our knowledge of Nature is thus always a mathe- 
matical one and is based either on simple measurement, 
such as in morphological and descriptive sciences, or on 
a measurement of causation as in physical and physiologi- 
cal sciences. But with the assistance of mathematics, of 
measure, weight and number only relative or quantitative 
differences can be understood . . . Real qualita- 
tive differences we cannot determine since qualities can- 
not be compared. This is an important fact for the 
knowledge of Nature. It follows from this fact that if 
there are in Nature qualitatively or absolutely different 
domains, scientific knowledge is only possible in an iso- 
lated way within the bounds of each of them, and no con- 
necting bridge leads from one domain into another. But 
from the same fact also follows that in so far as we can 



PROFESSORS AND LIMITS OF COGNITION 247 

investigate Nature connectedly, in so far as our measur- 
ing knowledge proceeds in a consistent, uninterrupted 
way, and as we come to an understanding of one 
phenomenon by means of another . . . absolute 
differences, impassable gulfs do not exist in Nature at 
all." 

This passage shows how very near our Munich pro- 
fessor came to a right and complete conception of the 
nature of knowledge. It is only wanted to dot the i's 
and to cross the t's. This little thing however, is of in- 
finite importance, since without it one always slides back 
into the intolerable error of wishing to formulate ab- 
solute or qualitative differences, to separate by an im- 
passible gulf the finite and infinite or the human and 
divine knowledge, and to describe two domains without a 
connecting bridge. 

This dualistic scandal must once for all be put an end 
to by going one little step further than Nageli. The 
faculty of cognition must be recognised as the faculty 
which embraces all differences, all qualities as a unity, 
as one solitary quantity. It is rational means : reason 
makes of all existence one order. To enroll under this 
order all the phenomena of the world as different species, 
is to know Nature. Because the intellect can do this, 
because it divides everything into orders and species, into 
subjects and predicates so that finally only one order re- 
mains, only one subject, Being or the Given Premises of 
which mind and body, reason, fancy, matter, force, etc., 
are predicates or species, — because of that there cannot 
possibly remain in the world any impassable gulf. Every- 
thing must reduce itself to a theoretical harmony, to one 
system. 

As soon as this i is dotted, it becomes no longer pos- 
sible to talk grandiloquently that there can be an absolute 



248 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

difference or impassable gulf between the inorganic and 
organic, between plant, animal, ape, man, mental and 
manual work, etc. One must know that two drops of 
water are just as infinitely different as animal and man, 
as body and soul, and that separation and differentiation 
are just as little limited as " striving after unity." 

I should like to make the reader understand what the 
professors, so far as I know them, have not yet under- 
stood, viz., that our intellect is a dialectical instrument, 
an instrument which reconciles all opposites. The in- 
tellect creates unity by means of the variety and com- 
prehends the difference in the equality. Hegel has made 
it clear long ago that in science there is no either — or, 
but as well as. The faculty of knowledge in the ape, the 
rustic and the scientist is just of the same category as 
that in the philosopher, and also the most divine know- 
ledge belongs to the same category, and are all forms of 
one variety, varieties of one order, predicates of one sub- 
ject. It is certainly admissible to distinguish between 
the human and the animal intellect, to raise the former 
to the skies and give it a different name. But it is just as 
inadmissible to create an impassable gulf between reason 
and instinct. If we reason soberly and do not indulge in 
extravagant exclamations we are bound to recognise that 
the faculty of discrimination separates infinitely but also 
connects endlessly. 

Nageli says : " It is a logical necessity for the 
scientist to allow in the finite Nature only gradual dis- 
tinctions." Our reply to this is : it is a logical necessity 
to throw the infinite and the finite into the same heap, 
that is to conceive of Nature as a unity which is both 
finite and infinite. 

" But what is the world which is dominated by the 
human mind ? Not even a grain of sand in the eternity of 



PROFESSORS AND LIMITS OF COGNITION 249 

space, not even a second in the eternity of time, but is an 
outwork of the true essence of the All." That's exactly 
the language of the parson. And it is quite true, if it is 
only meant as an emphatic expression of sentiment in 
view of the greatness of existence ; but is also very in- 
sipid, if the professor takes it to mean that our space and 
our time were not part and parcel of the infinite and 
eternal, — very insipid, if it is meant to express that the 
* true essence of the All ? is hidden beyond the phenomena 
in the infathomable region of metaphysics or religion. 
The All is to be found in its moments, and to seek it else- 
where is a task which Social-Democrats willingly leave 
to the ruling classes. 

V. 

After Prof. Nageli had thus tried to curb our scientific 
knowledge of Nature his example was followed at the 
same meeting by Prof. Virchow in order to restrict still 
further the " freedom of science in the modern State." 
His eyes are so sensitive that they cannot stand even the 
feeble light which Nageli had put up. 

" I should like to prove to you that we have arrived 
at a point where we must make it our special business to 
moderate ourselves and to renounce to a certain extent 
our predilections and personal views so as to keep up the 
good temper which the nation still exhibits towards us." 

What a miserable " nation " this is, whose good temper 
the professor desires to preserve, will prove no puzzle to 
our comrades. We recognise the well-to-do by this mere 
predilection for the moderation of others, by their sensi- 
tiveness to everything which may interfere with their 
digestion. 

" It goes without saying that we must demand for 
everything which we consider to be well established scien- 



250 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

tific truth complete adoption in the national store oi 
knowledge; this the nation must absorb, — this it musf 
consume and digest." 

Our professor is right; there are some truths which 
are too patent to allow of being hushed up, and thertf 
are others which can serve the revolutionary tendencies 
and must, therefore be " moderated," though science un-' 
mistakably gravitates to them. 

" We cannot proceed to explain to every yokel : this 
is true, established by fact, this is fairly known and that 
is only a conjecture. . . . We must abstain front 
putting into the heads of our schoolmasters what wtf 
merely conjecture. . . . After all, this theory oi 
evolution, too, when consistently carried to its logical 
conclusion, has some very dangerous aspects, and it will 
not have escaped your attention, I hope, that Social- 
Democracy has taken cognizance of it." 

This hardly requires any comment. One needs only 
listen to the man to perceive at once how it stands with 
the " Freedom of science in the modern State." Knowl- 
edge must naturally be still more restricted by Virchow 
than it was by his colleague, Nageli. 

" In thus narrowing the limits of our knowledge we 
must remember above all that what is commonly called 
natural science is like all other knowledge in the world 
made up of three heterogeneous elements. Usually we 
merely distinguish between objective and subjective 
knowledge. Yet we have still a third, a sort of medium 
element, namely, that of belief, which, as you know, also 
exists in science." 

This subtle distinction which the artful dodger, for the 
sake of his reputation, thereupon draws between scien- 
tific and religious belief, need not be taken seriously, but 
the ingenious way in which he scents the weak points o' 



PROFESSORS AND LIMITS OF COGNITION 2$I 

his predecessor deserves some acknowledgement. Nageli 
had said : 

" Reflex action is clearly bound up in higher animals 
with sensitiveness. We must also grant it in the case of 
lower animals, and we have no reason to deny it in case 
of plants and inorganic bodies. ... In virtue of 
its structure out of different parts the atom possesses 
various properties and powers, accordingly it also exer- 
cises various influences (attraction and repulsion) upon 
other atoms. ... If, therefore, the molecules ex- 
perience something akin to sensitiveness it must also be a 
pleasure to them if they can follow their sympathies and 
antipathies, etc. . . . The molecules of chemical 
elements are, therefore, swayed by a number of qualita- 
tively and quantitatively different sensations. . . . 
We accordingly find in the lowest and simplest organiza- 
tions of matter of which we know, essentially the same 
phenomena as in the highest. . . . The difference is 
merely that of degree." 

To that Virchow replied: "This is the objection 
which I make to the statements of Herr Nageli. . . . 
He not only wants us to extend the domain of mind to 
animals and plants, but also that we finally pass with 
our views of the nature of mental phenomena from the 
organic to the inorganic world. ... If mental 
phenomena are at all costs to be brought in connection 
with those of the rest of the world, then one necessarily 
arrives at transferring first the psychical phenomena as 
they are found in man and the highest organized vertebra 
to the lower and ever lower animals, and then to endow 
even plants with a soul; then it is the cell which feels 
and thinks, and finally there is a gradual transition even 
to the chemical atoms which hate and love each other, 
seek or avoid each other. ... I do not object to 



252 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

atoms of carbon also having a mind, ■. . . but I 
do not see anything by which it could be known. It is a 
mere play upon words. By declaring attraction and 
repulsion to be mental, psychical phenomena we simply 
throw the psychical overboard. ... To us the 
sum total of psychical phenomena is undoubtedly only 
associated with certain animals and not with the whole 
of organic life, not even with all animals. This I de- 
clare without hesitation." 

We must acknowledge that Virchow is in one respect 
perfectly right : ideas with a distinct meaning in language 
should remain distinct. One must not play with words ; 
but neither must one shut his eyes to the fact that the 
psychical sensation of pleasure and pain presents a cer- 
tain analogy to the chemical attraction and repulsion. 
Let us only dot the i, and then the two will appear as 
equally legitimate forms of the same Nature, as the 
equally intelligible predicate of the same subject. Only 
those who utterly refuse to connect the mental phenom- 
ena with those of the rest of the world, will fail to per- 
ceive that the animal and chemical, the physical and psy- 
chical phenomena are common varieties of the great 
world process. And once more, gentlemen: The world 
is dialectical, as much one or homogeneous in essence as 
varied in the manner it appears; all distinction is only 
that of degree. The unity which Nageli defends is lost 
to him as soon as he lands in " the world of presenti- 
ment " and at " divine omniscience ;" but that unity is 
already lost to Virchow when he merely arrives at the 
distinction between organic and inorganic; still more 
intolerable is to him the link between animal and man; 
and as for the opposition between body and soul, — this 
he wants to keep outside the province of debate alto- 
gether, as the bridging over of this opposition " in the 



PROFESSORS AND LIMITS OF COGNITION 253 

head of the Socialist " was bound to cause an awful con- 
fusion and lead to the overthrow of all professorial 
wisdom. 



THE INCONCEIVABLE 

A SPECIAL CHAPTER IN SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC PHILOSOPHY 
(VOR WARTS, 1877) 

Both the clergy and the professors are of the opinion 
that the human intellect is debarred from the greatest 
possible knowledge and from the clearest possible un- 
derstanding. They agree in their endeavor to preserve 
to the human intellect the character of the limited under- 
standing of the poor commoner. Yet there is a differ- 
ence between the two camps. The clergy keep account 
of the human desire of a perfect light, in so far as they 
refer the poor commoner's intellect for support to the 
great spirit above who, through his revelations, en- 
lightens and makes known to man what is good for him 
to know. The Philosophers of our Universities, on the 
other hand, have their doubts about the great spirit above ; 
they are progressive and they substitute the earthly 
knowledge for the divine one, but for all that they show 
the same dualistic, half-hearted character in abstract 
thought as their colleagues, the " Progressists," in poli- 
tics. They exhibit the same mixture of mala fides and 
incapacity in wisdom as these colleagues in matters of lib- 
erty. They cannot make an end to all secret-mongering ; 
and if they find no mystery in heaven and the sacraments, 
then there must be something mystical in "the essence 
of things " and in " the ultimate reasons " of Nature, 
some insurpassable barriers or " limits of our cognition of 
Nature." Against such inveterate mystics it is as Social- 

254 



THE INCONCEIVABLE 255 

L ^hwL :uU our bounden duty to proclaim the limitless 
possibilities of the human intellect. 

No doubt there is much in Nature which is not yet 
fo;own,— * who would deny that ? Where is the man who 
never met with phenomena which he called wonderful, 
inexplicable, incomprehensible ! Who would find that un- 
natural? But what is really wonderful, incomprehen- 
sible and inexplicable is that there are still in the second 
half of the nineteenth century certain scholars who 
seriously speak of the limits of human understanding and 
believe in the real existence of wonderful things, of 
miracles which are beyond the understanding not of 
Peter or Paul, but beyond the horizon of mankind. 

We must, however, soon recover from our astonish- 
ment and try to comprehend the incomprehensible. And 
to do this, it is necessary to find the category to which 
it belongs. The incomprehensible is explained as soon 
as we recognise that it belongs to the category of 
thoughtlessness. It may appear presumptuous on my 
part to speak so disrespectfully of a thing which is 
treated by high authorities with such a solemn serious- 
ness. In science, however, all belief in authorities must 
cease. The capacities of the human intellect are so un- 
limited that they, in the course of time, make new dis- 
coveries, open new vistas which regularly make the old 
authorities appear as mere duffers. Though I am de- 
fending the view of the unlimited capacities of the human 
intellect, I am none the less thoroughly conscious of the 
limitation of all men and all times, and so I am, despite 
my exuberant spirits, a modest fellow. 

The intellect is, as is well known an organ with which 
we perceive. From the other organs of perception it is 
differentiated by its being the most essential factor. 
Without eyes we may still hear, taste and smell but with- 



256 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

out consciousness, without the spirit in our head the 
whole world is at an end. On the other hand a con- 
sciousness without the aid of the senses would know 
nothing. Thus it may be seen that they all belong to- 
gether. The intellect may be a captain but only so in 
connection with the private soldiers, our five senses and 
the things of the world. 

We may even regard the senses of man deficient, be- 
cause there are animals whose senses are more developed 
than his, but with regard to intellect man is no doubt 
superior to all other " creatures." " In this world " no- 
body has ever met with a superior mind to that of man. 
How it stands " in the other world " with angels, gob- 
lins and nymphs, history can tell us nothing about that. 
And even if we admit for a moment that supernatural 
spirits crowd the stars and moons, they must, insofar as 
they bake bread, use flour, and not metal or wood for this 
purpose. If the supernatural spirits are endowed with 
reason, then that reason cannot be of any other general 
nature than ours. If the metaphysical intellect is differ- 
ent, and perhaps of the nature of wood or tallow, then 
we must be permitted to deny it the name of intellect. 
We may only use the language as it is customary. It 
has divided things into classes and varieties and we must 
accept them as such if we want to be comprehensible 
and reasonable. If there are things in heaven or in some 
transcendental region, which are of a nature totally dif- 
ferent from the things on earth, then they must be given 
other names ; and not being adepts of the angel-language 
we cannot reasonably say anything with regard to 
"something higher," the metaphysical or ghostly. 

Strange and yet true ! Such reasoning is exasperating 
to our philosophers. Kant has told them something and 
they are going on rehearsing it: only the natural phe- 



THE INCONCEIVABLE 257 

notnena can be conceived; but what is behind them, the 
" thing in itself " or the mystery — that, thou poor hu- 
man intellect, is inconceivable by thee. And yet that 
whole mystery, the whole secret, is nothing but an ex- 
aggerated idea which they got about the intellect. Al- 
though they pretend limitation and continually speak of 
the incapacity to go beyond the limits of cognition, they 
cannot get rid of the exaggerated notion of an incon- 
ceivable conceivability, or of the idea of a monster-mind 
who could understand where there is nothing to be un- 
derstood. 

Aha! — my keen opponent will retort — you see! you 
speak somehow of things which no man can understand. 
Then there are inconceivable things. Well, well ! 

Yes, my dear mystic ! I should like to see the wonder- 
ful things discussed, provided that they are stripped of 
their wonderful metaphysical character. There is much 
that is incomprehensible, there are limits to our under- 
standing, but only in the sober sense of the word, just 
as there are things invisible and inaudible, just as there 
are limits to the capacity of our senses of seeing and hear- 
ing. Everything has its natural limit, and so has also 
the intellect. If musical tunes, sweet scents, the gravity 
of bodies are not visible to the eye, it is because the 
eye has reasonable limits, and not because the eye has 
unnatural limits in a metaphysical sense, which denotes 
human inferiority in comparison with some over-human 
superiority. Inferior a thing may be in comparison with 
another of the same class, but in general all things are 
perfect — they can't be otherwise. A more perfect wood 
than that which is generally growing on earth could not 
be grown in metaphysics. When the wood changes com- 
pletely the character of its kind then we can't call it 
wood anv more. Or should we deal with iron woods? 



258 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Just as wood is limited by its wooden nature, so is the 
eye limited to visible things. And just as the eye, the 
general eye, sees all that is visible, so does the intellect, 
especially the human intellect, perceive everything which 
is reasonable. Unreasonable things, which can't be rea- 
soned out and understood, do not belong to its domain, 
and that is no more a defect, a barrier of the intellect, 
than the incapacity of the eye to see without light, or to 
feel a toothache. Monster-eyes may possess such an 
unnatural capacity of seeing. 

In order to make an end to the gruesome talk of the 
Inconceivable and of the " limits of knowledge of Na- 
ture " in the metaphysical sense it is necessary to be clear 
about this question : What does it mean to know, to 
explain, to perceive? I repeat the cause of all supersti- 
tion, of all religious and philosophic metaphysics, is to 
be found in the exaggerated idea of the function of the 
intellect, in the unreasonable demands made upon the 
faculty of cognition — that is, in epistemological ig- 
norance. Our contemporaries have an inkling of this 
fact. The learned magazines teem with discussions on 
that subject-matter, and nearly approach the truth, but 
the full light is still missing, and can only be given by 
Social-Democrats. It is the possession of that light 
which enables our party to handle the intellect with 
systematic precision and to clear away the philosophic 
and theological mysteries guarded until now by the priv- 
ileged classes. 

Just as the peasant misunderstands the principle of 
mechanics, so does the professor of Philosophy mis- 
understand the principle of the intellectual function. It 
is difficult to make untrained brains understand that all 
levers and wheels do not increase the volume of a power, 
but merely distribute the pressure and thus enable us to 



THE INCONCEIVABLE 259 

handle it in an easier manner. But still more difficult 
is it to convince the professors of Philosophy that all 
cognition, comprehension and explanation is simply a 
formal act. The phenomena of the world and of life 
must be regarded as comprehended and explained when 
they are divided into classes, families, varieties, species, 
etc., and brought into a formal scientific schedule show- 
ing how they belong to one another and how they follow 
each other. 

When a monster meets me in the forest, which, on 
account of my defective knowledge of natural history, 
makes me wonder as to what it is, and when at the same 
time a naturalist comes along and informs me that it is 
not a cannibal, but a rhinoceros which belongs to the 
family of pachyderms whose home is in Africa, Asia, 
etc., then under such a systematic registration my aston- 
ished ignorance turns into clear knowledge. And when 
I ask the physicist why the falling body increases in 
velocity from second to second, he will explain it to me 
by the law of gravitation, that is, he brings the different 
phenomena into one class and subordinates them under 
one scientific formula. All our reasoning, explaining 
and knowing cannot ask for more and ought not ask 
for more of our intellectual force. Those who demand 
more of the intellect are like the ignorant mechanic who 
seeks to invent the Perpetiium Mobile. 

" Physics," says Schopenhauer, " explains the phe- 
nomena by something still more unknown, by natural 
laws, natural forces, etc. Such explanations are, like 
the devil with the cloven foot, afflicted with the defect 
that they themselves need to be explained." The same 
philosopher says in another place : " However great the 
progress may be which physics makes, it does not bring 
us a single step nearer to metaphysics. . . . Under 



2(X) PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

metaphysics I (Schopenhauer) understand any alleged 
knowledge which goes beyond the possibility of expe- 
rience, in order to furnish us with information as to what 
is behind Nature. . . . Even if one has traversed all 
stars and planets, no step was made into the region of 
metaphysics." With those words the famous man has 
stated two things : First, that metaphysics lies in Cloud- 
lands; secondly, that he, with his inordinate desire for 
crazy explanations, still sticks to the metaphysical craving. 
He calls man " animal metaphysicum," whereby he wants 
to say that it is metaphysics which distinguishes man 
from the animal. As against that I am of deliberate 
opinion that the descent of man begins just where the 
metaphysical or philosophical animal disappears. 

No doubt, the thing has, as everything else, different 
sides. Metaphysics or the exaggerated ideas had to pro- 
ceed in order to lead to the sober view that our intellect 
is an ordinary, formal and mechanical force. The light 
of that conviction is even dawning everywhere, but still 
only dawning. How its ascent is hampered by the old 
exaggerated ideas may be seen daily in dozens of the 
learned reviews. For instance, in No. 34 of the Wage, 
1876, Dr. Kalischer remarks : " Newton as well as Dar- 
win starts from given material, to which the first applies 
his Law as a measure. But what he shows by such an 
application is the mathematical, the formal, while the 
essential of the physical process remains completely un- 
explained. . . . According to that we reach the 
highest summit of knowledge when we get the mathe- 
matical formula ; for the so-called ' explanation ' goes 
always so far as we can subordinate the natural phe- 
nomena under the principle of mechanism." 

Thus Dr. Kalischer knows the highest summit of 
knowledge, he is, so to speak, in agreement with Hobbes t 



THE INCONCEIVABLE 26l 

" Where there is nothing to add and nothing to subtract 
all thinking is at an end," yet he desires to climb to the 
highest-highest top in order to reach an explanation 
which overtops the " so-called explanation." Or in other 
words: Though our thinking force is in the last in- 
stance explained when we recognize it as a formal in- 
strument, yet there are people who speculate upon a 
monster-reason which should explain the world meta- 
physically. 

I can well imagine how the professors of Philosophy 
dislike our conception, but I should like to ask them most 
earnestly to kindly tell us what gives them the right to 
conclude from the natural limits of reason that there 
is an unnatural unlimited reason ; further to tell us why 
they don't conclude from the limited nature of a piece of 
tin-plate that there is a limitless, heavenly, metaphysical 
tin-plate. Such a conclusion can only be drawn by one 
who does not consider reason or tin-plate to be a natural 
thing which, like all other natural things, have their 
fixed limits defined by linguistic usage; only professors 
and scholars who carry in their bosom the last Mohican 
of a " higher " transcendental world, an exaggerated 
idea of a superhuman intellect, can draw such conclusions. 

After the clear statements of the philologists Max Miil- 
ler, of Oxford, or of William Dwight Whitney, that 
where the limit of things begins their names cease, all 
limitless fancyful speculations must cease. When our 
intellect reaches the point where there is nothing to be 
perceived, or where the Inconceivable begins, even then 
we have as little right to speak of a totally different 
world as when we reach the point with our voice where 
there is nothing more to sing. Where the singing 
ceases, howling may commence, and where theory is at an 
end, practice should begin. 



EXCURSIONS OF A SOCIALIST INTO THE DO- 
MAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY. 

(Social-Democratic Library, Hottingen-Zurich 
1887.) 

PREFACE 

The subject of the following articles seems to have so 
little in common with Social-Democracy that their publi- 
cation as part of the Social-Democratic Library necessi- 
tates a few words of explanation. 

The theory of cognition with which these Excursions 
deal has for its subject-matter the question, how is the 
instrument in our head constituted which everybody has 
to use in order to gain knowledge of the natural and 
human conditions which surround him, to distinguish, 
judge and understand them. 

An instrument which everybody possesses and uses 
may be called a democratic instrument. The intellect is 
common to all men and, therefore, is a concern of the 
community or society, a Social-Democratic instrument, a 
Social-Democratic concern. If Bismarck uses his instru- 
ment differently from Social-Democrats we are con- 
vinced that he makes a wrong use of his intellect. 

Absolute unanimity we can never attain, yet progress 
in this direction is unmistakable. So also will the theory 
of cognition never exhaust its subject and render us 
infallible in the use of our mental powers ; still we must 
not on that account renounce improvement. Social-De- 
mocracy, too, is strenuously working with the view of 

263 



264 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

making the minds more unanimous ; consequently a well- 
founded theory of cognition can only be of value to it. 

As I say, the theory of cognition deals with the ques- 
tion of how our instrument of thinking is constituted. By 
learning the nature of it we learn at the same time the 
use of it. Although the nature and the use of a thing 
may be regarded as two separate things, it is none the 
less permissible to coalesce them into one. In my opinion 
only that person is able to understand the nature of a 
violin who knows thoroughly how to play it — who 
knows what there is in it and what is to be done to bring 
it out of it. 

That men, with their instrument of thinking, have 
judged correctly, thought correctly and discriminated 
exactly without knowing anything of epistemology is, of 
course, unquestionable. The farmer knows how to grow 
potatoes without having attended an agricultural college. 
Yet one cannot but admit that science makes even the 
farmer more intelligent in his work. It teaches him how 
to predetermine the results of his work. If he still re- 
mains, in spite of his predetermination, at the mercy of 
wind and weather, yet it cannot be denied that science 
gives him the means to control Nature to a certain ex- 
tent. Absolutely free he will never be; science and re- 
flection cannot help him to sovereign power, still they 
help him. If we cease to be slaves of Nature we shall 
nevertheless ever remain her servants. Knowledge can 
only give the possible freedom which is at the same time 
the only rational one. 

And so the instrument which is analysed in the follow- 
ing pages is used by everyone at every opportunity. 
Nothing is so general and universal in the world of man 
as perception, discrimination, judgment, knowledge, etc. 
The theory of cognition must, therefore, be regarded as 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 265 

an elementary study, as the Alphabet, but in a higher 
sense. A trained intellect goes farther than the art of 
reading and writing. The celebrated Spinoza already 
left us an opuscule on the " Improvement of Under- 
standing," and it is to be regretted that his work has 
been left incomplete. And it is nothing less than the 
improvement of this instrument that we aim at in the 
present " Excursions into the domain of the theory of 
cognition." 

Whoever desires to be an intelligent Social-Democrat 
must improve his method of thinking. It was mainly the 
study of the improved method of thinking which helped 
the well-known founders of Social-Democracy, Marx and 
Engels, in raising Social-Democracy to a scientific stand- 
point on which it finds itself now. The improvement 
of the method of thinking is like every other improve- 
ment, a limitless problem, the solution of which must 
always remain unachieved. This, however, must in no 
wise keep us from striving after it. The only and nat- 
ural way consists in increasing our general knowledge 
by mastering the special branches of science. Although 
the theory of cognition, by setting out to illuminate the 
lamp from which all light emanates, touches the desired 
enlightment of the human mind at its very source, we 
are nevertheless modest enough to acknowledge that 
such a theory, be it ever so perfect, is not sufficient. 
Though all special branches of science are conducive to 
that end, yet none of them is able to form the generalisa- 
tion which could entirely illuminate the mind. This can 
only be achieved gradually, wherefore we shall be con- 
tent if these " Excursions " will have contributed some- 
thing to the general aim of science. 

Chicago, December 15, 1886. 

J. Dietzgen. 



ENTER. 

These words of von Haller are singularly apt to dem- 
onstrate on them, how even the " eternal truths " have 
succumbed to the corroding influence of time. This so 
often quoted line of the poet has even now numerous 
admirers who repeat it. The more reason have we to 
show those who believe in the old wisdom, what progress 
is being made by the ever-revolutionary criticism. 

The " created mind " is the special subject-matter of 
a special science calling itself " Philosophy." The mean- 
ing of this term has undergone many changes. In the 
times of the ancient Greeks a philosopher was a general 
lover of wisdom, whilst nowadays the growth of general 
culture has proceeded so far as to make people under- 
stand that with the general love no great results can be 
achieved. Whoever seeks wisdom must turn to science, 
which grows its fruit not in the hazy generality, but in 
concrete special fields. Philosophy, too, has become a 
special branch and has a special subject of study which 
is that of the " created mind." 

To speak precisely: since Kant's time Philosophy has 
begun to recognise that its former efforts had been more 
or less of a youthful dream, and that it must, like all 
other scientific branches, set before itself a definite aim 
if it is at all to arrive at some sort of result. Philosophy 
has since then become gradually modernised and has now 
finally settled down to a critique of cognition. 

266 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 267 

The created mind or the mental organ which has li &n 
implanted by Nature in the head of man, has always 
puzzled him as a mystery. The solution of this mystery 
has been effected by the observation that all things, all 
natural phenomena are mysterious as long as they are 
not understood, not investigated. The more intimately 
man gets acquainted with them, the more they lose their 
mysterious character. The mind is no exception to this 
rule. Since Philosophy has consciously, clearly and defi- 
nitely occupied itself with it, the mysterious unknown 
has become more known and has acquired quite a differ- 
ent complexion. 

Just as the fetishists deify the commonest things — 
stones and pieces of wood — so has the " created mind," 
too, been deified and wrapt in mystery — first by religion 
and afterwards by Philosophy. What religion used to 
call belief and supernatural world, was called by Philoso- 
phy metaphysics. Still we must acknowledge that the 
latter had for its laudable object to make of its study a 
science, — an aim which, indeed, it has finally achieved in 
a physical manner. Behind its own back there has arisen 
out of the metaphysical world-wisdom the special science 
of a modest theory of cognition. 

Nevertheless we do not wish to give the philosophers 
too much credit for that. The mind saw scientific light 
not merely through philosophical heads ; investigators of 
natural science, too, have at least indirectly, contributed 
something towards its elucidation. By enlightening the 
human mind in respect to other subjects science pre- 
pared the ground for, and provided the possibility of, an 
epistemological enlightenment. Before Philosophy could 
enter the innermost of the mind-function, it had to be 
shown by the practical achievements of natural science 
how the mental instrument of man possesses the hitherto 



268 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

doubted faculty of illuminating the innermost of Nature. 
The physicists do not close their eyes to the fact that 
there are many unknown worlds. Still some of them 
have yet to learn that the Unknown, too, is not so totally 
unknown and mysterious. Even the most unknown 
world and the most mysterious things are together with 
the known places and objects of one and the same cate- 
gory, namely, of the universal union of Nature. Owing 
to the conception of the Universe virtually existing, as 
a kind of an innate idea, in the human mind, the latter 
knows a priori that all things, the heavenly bodies in- 
cluded, exist in the Universe and are of universal, com- 
mon nature. The " created mind" proves no exception 
to this scientific law. 

The old religious world of ideas renders difficult the 
recognition of the truth that Nature is not only a nomi- 
nal but an actual monas which has neither above it, nor 
in it, nor alongside of it anything else, — not an uncreated 
mind, either. The belief in an uncreated, monstrous, re- 
ligious mind impedes the conception that the human mind 
itself has been created and produced by Nature — con- 
sequently is her own child towards which she knows no 
reserve. And yet Nature is reserved, — she never dis- 
closes her secrets all at a time or completely. She can- 
not give herself away entirely because she is inexhausti- 
ble in her treasures. Still the created mind, the child of 
Nature, is a lamp which illuminates not only the outer- 
most, but also the innermost of Nature. In view of the 
physically endless and inexhaustible and all-embracing 
Nature such expressions as Innermost and Outermost 
must be regarded as antiquated conceptions. The same 
holds true of the term " created mind " insofar as this 
expression suggests an uncreated great, monstrous, meta- 
physical spirit which has its seat beyond the clouds. 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 269 

The " great spirit " of religion is the cause of the dis- 
paragement of the human mind of which the poet is 
guilty when he denies to it the capacity of penetrating 
into the " Innermost of Nature." And at the same time 
the uncreated monstrous spirit is but a fantastical reflex 
of the naturally produced human mind. 

The theory of cognition in its most developed stage is 
able to prove this proposition up to the hilt. It has 
shown to us that the created mind derives all its ideas, 
conceptions and thoughts from the monistic world which 
science calls the " physical world." The created mind 
is the definite child of the world. Good mother Nature 
gave to it something of her inexhaustibility. Mind is as 
limitless and inexhaustible in gaining knowledge as Na- 
ture is in her readiness to open her breast. The child 
is only limited by the limitless wealth of its mother's love, 
— it cannot exhaust the inexhaustible. The created mind 
penetrates with its science into the innermost of Nature, 
but it cannot penetrate beyond that, — not because it is a 
narrowly limited mind, but because its mother is Infinite- 
Nature, a natural infinity having nothing besides it. 

The wonderful mother gave its child consciousness as 
an inheritance. The created mind comes into the world 
with the faculty of becoming conscious that it is the child 
of its good mother Nature which created for it the ability 
to form excellent images of all other children of its 
mother, of all its brothers and sisters. Thus the " created 
mind " possesses images, ideas, notions of air, water, 
earth, fire, etc., and at the same time the consciousness 
that these pictures which it had formed, are each true 
and adequate images. No doubt, the mind finds by ex- 
perience that the children of Nature are changeable, 
that, for instance, water consists of various kinds of 
Waters of which no drop is absolutely like the other ; but 



270 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

that much it has inherited from its mother: to know by 
its own nature and a priori that water cannot alter its 
general nature without ceasing to be water and without 
losing all sense; it therefore knows, so to speak, pro- 
phetically that however much things may change, their 
general nature, their general essence cannot change. The 
created mind can never know all the possibilities and im- 
possibilities of its uncreated mother; but that water is 
under all circumstances wet, or that mind, be it even 
met with beyond the clouds, cannot change its general 
nature,— - this the created mind knows apodictically and 
of its own innate nature. The created mind, child of 
nature that it is, possesses the innate faculty of knowing 
that reason must be rational, that nature must be natural, 
that water must be liquid and that the uncreated spirit 
must be a monstrous absurdity. 

The above may seem to be a mere assertion without 
proof. Yet, since every reader carries about with him 
the proof of these facts in his head, I may be spared the 
trouble to bring proofs from other quarters. One need 
only ask his own head whether it does not know prophet- 
ically that if there be a reason on the moon that reason 
may be smaller or greater than that of Peter or Paul, 
but must, in spite of all possible variations, remain as re- 
gards its magnitude and power within certain reasonable 
limits. 

The knowledge of the " created mind," accumulated in 
the course of centuries by Philosophy and Science, cul- 
minates in the doctrine that this mind is a force, a force 
of nature, like that of gravitation, like heat, light, elec- 
tricity, etc., and that alongside of its general nature, it 
possesses, like all other forces, a special nature of its own 
which distinguishes it from all other forces and makes it 
knowable. If we closely examine this special nature of 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 2JI 

the * : created mind," we find that it possesses an innate, 
and, if you like, " wonderful " faculty of knowing with 
perfect sureness and without further inquiries that two 
mountains must have a valley between them, that a part 
is smaller than the whole, that circles are not square and 
that bears are not elephants. This wonderful faculty of 
the mind deserves every notice, since from it follows the 
further positive knowledge that the idea of another mind, 
besides the familiar human mind, — the idea of a mind 
which is above all known minds, is an extravagant idea, 
an ideological extravagance. 

The created mind has inherited from its mother Nature 
the faculty, developed by experience, to classify the other 
creatures of nature, to distinguish and to name them. 
Thus it distinguishes the beech from the oak, the bears 
from the elephants ; it classifies the world and is convinced 
that such classification is justified, and true, clear, and 
distinct. That this classification is subject to develop- 
ment and, consequently, to certain modifications, to lim- 
ited changes, does not alter, and is no contradiction of, 
the fact that on the whole the classification made by the 
human mind is a well-defined, stable and durable one. 
From this it follows that what is called in New York 
bread may be called in Paris du pain, that is, bread may 
change its name, but it always and everywhere remains 
bread. It may also be of various kinds, forms and tints 
and be made of various kinds of flour, but these forms 
cannot alter its essence. The oak may be of different 
varieties, but it cannot vary beyond the limits of its spe- 
cies. The same with bears : there are large and small, 
brown and black, but there can be none which drop out 
of their species entirely. 

Such knowledge is supplied to us through the objective 
research of the " creative mind." 



2J2 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

We refer to these facts in order to make it clear that 
we are as sure in this respect with regard to the mind 
as we are with regard to bread, oak or bear. There may 
be on other planets many minds which we do not know, 
but on the whole, according to their species they cannot be 
constituted differently from those " created minds " which 
we know, without dropping out not only from the name, 
but also from the conception. The supernatural mind 
is a fantastic conception. 

Just as fantastical is also the conception of Nature by 
those who speak of a Nature which shuts her innermost 
against the " creative mind." Nature is the Unlimited. 
Those who grasp this grasp also that with reference to 
her there can be no question of beginning and end, of 
the above and below, of the innermost and outermost. 
All these terms do not refer to Nature in general, which 
is the absolute, but merely to her parts, to her products, 
the single things. 

With our hands we only grasp the tangible, with our 
eyes only the visible, etc., but with our conception we 
grasp the whole Nature, the Universe. With all that 
our faculty of conception need not be conceited and look 
down on the senses as on something quite inferior and 
limited. That faculty, innate in the human head, would 
as little be able to form a conception without the aid of 
the senses as would the eye to see, the ears to hear, the 
hands to touch without the assistance of the mind. Just 
as the whole depends on the particulars, so all particu- 
lars depend on the Nature as a whole. 

If we wish to form a concrete picture of Nature and 
its created mind we must, above all, infuse the latter 
with the consciousness that it must not raise itself above 
the mother as it did when it dreamt of a super- and ex- 
tra-natural mind. A proper conception of the human 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 273 

mind, a conception which thinks of this piece of Nature 
neither extravagantly, nor disparagingly, but exactly, — 
such a conception can only be gained if we become pos- 
sessed of the clear and distinct consciousness of the uni- 
versality of Nature. Then we perceive that the mys- 
terious character which was ascribed to her, is a fancy. 
We see then and learn from experience how frankly uni- 
versal Nature goes about her work. Our mind is her 
own product. She endowed it with the faculty and 
mission to gain knowledge of her and of all her phe- 
nomena. I say " of all " and use the term in a reasona- 
ble and moderate sense of the word, without failing to 
consider that Nature is inexhaustible in the production 
of her phenomena, and that the " created mind," so far 
as it is but a piece of Nature, can, in spite of its uni- 
versality in conceiving, only be a limited creature of Na- 
ture. 

Do we not possess a sense of touch which feels every- 
thing tangible? Maybe, that there is an animal whose 
feelers are still more delicate than the nerves of the human 
skin. Have we on that account cause to complain of 
our limited sense of touch or of the inadequacy of Na- 
ture? Perhaps, we should have, if she had not endowed 
us with a mind which is inventive enough to acquire in- 
struments by whose means we can discover things inac- 
cessible to the most delicate feelers. 

In short, whoever considers the results of natural sci- 
ence cannot accuse Nature of a mysterious reservedness, 
and whoever at the same time takes stock of the results 
of Philosophy cannot fail to notice that the human mind 
is called upon to solve all possible problems. But the 
Impossible has neither sense nor reason and must not 
therefore form the object of our observation and atten- 
tion. 



274 Philosophical essays 

What did we say? The Impossible had neither sense 
nor reason? Are we to postulate reason in something 
else besides the human head? Are we not, we human 
beings, the highest ones to possess a mind, reason, under- 
standing, a faculty of cognition? The latter being the 
special subject of this chapter, we may as well deal with 
the question now. 

Just as the faculty of seeing is connected organically 
with light and color, or the subjective sense of touch with 
tangible objects, so also is the created mind connected 
with the riddle of Nature. Without comprehensible 
things in the external world there can really be no under- 
standing inside the head. To have missed this inter- 
relation of things was the fault of those backward epis- 
temologists who have such hazy notions of mind and 
Nature that they seek for a solution beyond the clouds. 

The exaggerated disparagement of the mind which is 
said not to be able to illuminate the innermost of Nature, 
just as the exaggerated mystification of Nature whose 
innermost is said to be impenetrable — both arise out of 
a method of thinking which for thousands of years has, 
like a natural growth, dominated mankind. This has 
now changed; the efforts of philosophy have now suc- 
ceeded at last in making man the master of his way of 
thinking, — at least in so far as to be able to solve the 
problems, which are confronting him, with more skill 
and method. 

Philosophy has discovered the art of thinking. That 
it has thereby occupied itself so much with the all-perfect 
Being, with the conception of God, with the " Substance " 
of Spinoza, with the " thing in itself " of Kant, and with 
the " Absolute " of Hegel, has its good reason in the 
fact that the sober conception of the Universe as of the 
All-One with nothing above or outside or alongside of 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 275 

it, is the first postulate of a skilled and consistent mode 
of thinking, which knows both of itself and of all possi- 
ble and impossible objects that they all belong to one 
eternal and limitless union which is called by us Cosmos, 
Nature and Universe. 

We think to have proved thereby that a higher mind 
than the human one is not possible. My mind and thine 
are limited minds because they are only parts and frag- 
ments of the human mind in general. The minds of men 
are connected with one another, one supplements the 
other, one learns from the other, and this connection 
forms the progressive, developing process of the mind 
of the species. " On the tree of mankind blossoms sprout 
and throng upon blossoms." How high that tree may 
grow yet, we do not know ; but that it will not grow 
right into heaven — that we know a priori, positively, 
apodictically. 

We, therefore, on the one hand, assert, we do not know 
what is possible for Nature to accomplish. She may 
yet in the long run bring out wonderful things such as 
no imagination could ever have dreamt of. And yet we 
assert, on the other hand, that we know apodictically 
what is impossible. 

How, then, does it stand with this contradictory knowl- 
edge of the Possible and Impossible? 

Quite simply; our undoubted knowledge of the im- 
possibility of a supernatural, uncreated mind rests on 
the critique of reason which is also called by another 
name: theory of cognition. This branch of study has 
selected as its special object of inquiry the empirical mind 
and has found out that the mind possesses the undoubted 
conviction of the universality of Nature, that the con- 
sciousness of unity, infinity and immensity is innate in 
it, at least as a predisposition. 



276 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

The parson was already convinced that his divine om- 
nipotence can do nothing bad. Why should we not be 
convinced that the natural omnipotence, the creator of 
the human reason, can not have created anything irra- 
tional, illogical ? There is, of course, enough irrationality 
in Nature, that is, enough which is comparatively or sec- 
ondarily irrational. But of such irrationality as would 
completely and absolutely overstep the boundaries of its 
kind, we cannot even conceive, — Nature simply does not 
permit it to our faculty of thinking. She has endowed 
our mind with the conviction that she cannot be irra- 
tional and illogical to such an extent. 

The omnipotent Nature has created Reason and im- 
planted in it the consciousness that her omnipotence is a 
rational force which cannot be so illogical as to create 
minds or beings which are still more omnipotent than the 
natural omnipotence. It is a law of natural logic and 
logical nature that everything must remain within the 
natural species, that though species and varieties may 
change, yet not so extravagantly as to outgrow the gen- 
eral species, the natural. There can, therefore, be no 
mind which should penetrate so deeply into the inner- 
most of Nature as to be able to clasp her and pocket her, 
as it were. 

Is this certainty, given to us by Nature, wonderful ? 
Is it inexplicable that the thinking fragment of Nature 
should possess from its mother the conviction that the 
omnipotence of Nature is a rational omnipotence ? Would 
it not have been more inexplicable if the child of its 
mother were compelled to think that the latter is omnipo- 
tent and omnipresent in an irrational sense? 

Yes, Nature is in every respect wonderful whether 
we contemplate her in a superficial manner or penetrate 
into her innermost recesses. But withal, her natural 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 277 

wonderf ulness is explicable. Still more wonderful, how- 
ever, are the people who dream of an intellect wonderful 
beyond all measure, in comparison with which the won- 
derfulness of Nature would be trivial. 



II. 

THE ABSOLUTE TRUTH AND ITS NATURAL MANIFESTATIONS. 

Was it Goethe or Heine? It is one or the other who 
said: only the know- and have-nots are modest. I re- 
pudiate, accordingly, all such modesty because I believe 
myself in a position to make a small contribution to the 
great work of science. I am strengthened in this belief 
by the May number of the Nette Zeit (1886), where 
my efforts are honorably mentioned by our highly meri- 
torious Frederic Engels in an article on Ludwig Feuer- 
bach. In such cases the personal and objective elements 
are so closely bound up with one another that an exag- 
gerated modesty can only hinder the progress of the ob- 
jective inquiry. 

The things which I am going to discuss here were 
already set forth by me some seventeen years ago in an 
opuscle which then appeared. Yet what I said at that 
time is so scanty that in view of the progress since made 
on the subject I feel justified in returning to it once more. 
Already Hegel said in his preface to the " Phenomenology 
of Mind" quite aptly: "The easiest thing is to judge 
what has substance and solidity ; more difficult is to con- 
ceive it ; and most difficult of all, because it must contain 
both judgment and conception, is to reproduce it by de- 
scription." In fully endorsing these words I forbear to 
give an adequate presentation of the case now before 
me ; all I should attempt here is to sketch the essence of 
the cherished epistemological question, which I have in 

278 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 279 

my mind, in all brevity and with as much precision as I 
can command. I hope that the task thus defined may 
justify me in explaining in a few words — by way of 
elucidating the subject — how I came across it. 

The year 1848 with its reactionaries, constitutionalists, 
democrats and socialists called forth in my then youthful 
mind an irresistible desire to acquire a critically firm, 
undoubted standpoint, a positive opinion as to what in 
all that I had heard and read for and against was abso- 
lutely and unmistakably true, good and right. As I had 
my just doubts about God in heavens, and the church 
did not inspire me with any confidence at all, I found 
myself amidst the greatest perplexity, not knowing how 
to escape from the situation. While on search I came 
across Ludwig Feuerbach, and the diligent study of his 
writings gave me a good push forward. Of still greater 
help in my thirst for knowledge was the " Communist 
Manifesto," which I got to know through the newspapers 
on the occasion of the trial of the Communists at Cologne 
(1849). Most of all, however, I owe, after a number of 
old philosophical volumes had in the meanwhile appeared 
in my rural life, to the work of Marx which appeared in 
1859 under the title : " A Contribution to the Critique of 
Political Economy/' There it is stated in the preface 
that the way — so approximately runs the sentence — in 
which man earns his daily bread, that the level of civili- 
sation on which a generation physically works, determines 
the mental standpoint or the way in which it conceives 
and must conceive the True, the Good and Right, God, 
Freedom and Immortality, Philosophy, Politics and Law. 

Everything that I have studied and read all my life 
referred to one point which I desired and made mental 
efforts to grasp, viz. : how to attain a positive, undoubted 
knowledge, that is, to a criterion of what is true and 



28o PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

right. The above passage leads us to the true path 
which shows how it altogether stands with human knowl- 
edge and with the absolute and relative truth. 

What I have just related as a personal experience is 
the experience which mankind, too, has made in the course 
of centuries. If I had been the first to moot these ques- 
tions and to exhibit the thirst for the absolute truth, I 
would have been the fool to wait for an answer in all 
eternity. The fact, however, that I was not left such a 
fool, but received a sufficient answer, is due to the his- 
torical development of things which made me put the 
questions at a time when after a long series of preceding 
generations the best minds had occupied themselves with 
their solution and could already supply me with such 
elucidation as I obtained, in point of fact, from Feuerbach 
and Marx. What I mean to say by this is, the light 
which those men gave me was not merely the product of 
these individuals, but it was the common product of cul- 
ture older than the historical times. 

At first sight it seems as if there was little agreement 
among the predecessors, — who, begining with the Greek 
Thales and ending with the Prussian Jurgen Bona Meyer 
at Bonn, have enquired after the absolute truth. A closer 
examination, however, will reveal the red line which, run- 
ning from generation to generation, becomes ever more 
distinct and patent. It is the lack of appreciation of the 
importance of the historical which even now misleads 
some people to look in the innermost of their heads for 
that enlightenment which with a little more historical 
sense they would have found in the products matured in 
the gradual development of science through the long 
period of centuries. 

But to the point. By way of reply to the question, 
what is truth, absolute truth, Pilate shrugged his shoul- 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 28l 

ders as if to say, that is too high for me, — go and ask 
the High-Priest Caiaphas. The latter then said the same 
which priests say to this day : God is truth, — it is super- 
natural, super-earthly. It is not worth while at the 
close of the nineteenth century to trouble myself with 
the refutation of such an answer. On the other hand, 
Pilates are still too numerously represented even among 
the leaders of science to hinder a rational enlightenment 
on that point. 

To understand more clearly the nature of the absolute 
truth it is first of all necessary to do away with the old- 
rooted prejudice which regards it as of a purely mental 
nature. No, no! Absolute truth can be seen, heard, 
smelt, touched and, of course, also known; but it cannot 
be resolved into pure knowledge, — it is not pure mind. 
Its nature is not either corporeal, or mental, not one or 
the other, but all embracing, as much corporeal as spir- 
itual. Absolute truth has no nature of its own, but, on 
the contrary, it has the nature of the general. In other 
words, to speak without mystification, the general natural 
nature and general truth are identical. There are no 
two Natures, one corporeal and another a mental. There 
is only one Nature which contains all bodies and all 
minds. 

The Universe is identical with Nature, with the world 
and the absolute truth. Natural science divides Nature 
into parts, domains, branches of study, but it knows and 
feels that all such divisions are formal only, that Nature 
or Universe is in spite of all divisions undivided, — in 
spite of all variety and manifold natures only one indi- 
visible, general and universal Nature, World and Truth. 
There is only one Existence, and all forms are modi, va- 
rieties or relative truths of one general truth which is 
absolute, eternal and endless at all times, in all places. 



282 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Human knowledge is, like anything else, a limited por- 
tion of the unlimited, a modus, a variety of Existence 
or General Truth. 

Since the nature of truth has hitherto been regarded 
as purely mental, and accordingly, truth was looked upon 
as a thing which is only to be found in knowledge, the 
inquiry into human knowledge comes within the prov- 
ince of our subject, of our search after the absolute and 
relative truth and their relation. 

The mental world of man, that is, all we know, believe 
and think, forms a portion of the universal world which 
only in its absolute inter-relation, in its complete whole 
possesses an unlimited, perfect, absolute existence, a true 
one in the highest sense of the word. At the same time 
it possesses through its component parts, modi, varieties, 
products or phenomena an infinite number of existences 
of which every particular one is also true, but is as 
against the whole a mere relative truth. 

Human knowledge, itself a relative truth, is the me- 
dium between us and the other phenomena or relativities 
of the absolute Existence. Still the faculty of cognition, 
the knowing subject, must be distinguished from the ob- 
ject, the distinction being, however, a limited and relative 
one, since both the subject and the object are not only 
distinct, but at the same time alike in that they are parts 
or phenomena of the same generality called the Universe. 
We distinguish between Nature and parts, departments 
or phenomena, though these are inseparably connected 
with the All-Existence, emerge from it and submerge 
in it. There is no Nature without phenomena, her mani- 
festations, nor phenomena without Nature, as the Abso- 
lute. It is only our knowledge which provides the sepa- 
ration, the mental analysis in order to form an image of 
the phenomena. Knowledge, conscious of its doings ano> 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 283 

dealings, must know that the mentally separated, differ- 
entiated objects are indivisibly bound up with the reality 
of Nature. 

What we learn to know are truths, relative truths or 
natural phenomena. Nature itself, the absolute truth, 
cannot be known, — not directly, but only through her 
manifestations, the phenomena. How then do we know 
that there is behind the phenomenon an absolute Truth, 
a general Nature? Is this not a new mysticism? 

Well, let us see. As human knowledge is not the ab- 
solute truth, but only an artist making pictures of the 
truth, true, genuine, correct and exact pictures, it is self- 
evident that the picture does not exhaust the object and 
that the artist cannot reach the comprehensiveness of the 
model. Nothing more insipid has ever been said of truth 
and knowledge than what has been repeated for thou- 
sands of years by the commonly accepted logic, namely, 
that truth is the conformity of our knowledge with its 
object. How can a picture "conform" with its model? 
Approximately it can. What picture worth the name 
does not agree approximately with its object? Every 
portrait is more or less of a likeness. But to be alto- 
gether alike, quite the same as the original — what an 
abnormal idea! 

Thus we can only know Nature and her parts rela- 
tively, since even a part, though only a relation of Na- 
ture, possesses again the characteristics of the Absolute, 
the nature of the All-Existence which cannot be ex- 
hausted by knowledge. 

How, then, do we know that behind the phenomena of 
Nature, behind the relative truths, there is a universal, 
unlimited, absolute Nature which does not reveal itself 
cofi>pletely to man ? Our vision is limited, so are also our 
h' "hg, touch, etc., and our knowledge; yet we know of 



284 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

all these things that they are limited parts of the Unlim- 
ited. Whence that knowledge? 

It is innate ; it is given to us with consciousness. The 
consciousness of man is the knowledge of his personality 
as part of the human species, of mankind and of the 
Universe. To know is to form pictures in the conscious- 
ness that they are pictures of things which all, both the 
pictures and the things, possess a general mother from 
which they have issued and to which they will return. 
This mother is the absolute truth; she is perfectly true 
and yet mystical in a natural way, that is, she is the inex- 
haustible source of knowledge and consequently never 
entirely to be comprehended. 

All that is known in and of the world is, however true 
and exact, only a known truth, therefore a modified truth, 
a modus or part of truth. When I say that the con- 
sciousness of the endless, absolute truth is innate in us, 
is one and the only knowledge a priori, I am confirmed 
in my statement also by the experience of this innate 
consciousness. We learn that every beginning and end 
are only a relative beginning and end, at the bottom of 
which lies the Inexhaustible by all experience, the Ab- 
solute. We learn by experience that each experience 
is only a part of that which, in the words of Kant, sur- 
passes all experience. 

The mystic of a fantastical character will, perhaps, 
say: then, there is something after all which surpasses 
the limits of physical experience. We reply, yes and 
no at the same time. In the sense of the old exaggerat- 
ing metaphysician, there is nothing of this kind. In the 
sense of the cognition conscious of its nature, each parti- 
cle, be it of dust or of stone or of wood, is incomprehensi- 
ble as to its whole extent, each particle being an inex- 
haustible material for the human faculty of cognition. 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 285 

consequently something which surpasses all experience. 

When I say that the consciousness of the absence of a 
beginning and end of the physical world is an innate 
consciousness which is not acquired by experience, — in 
other words, that it is a consciousness which is given a 
priori and precedes all experience, I must still add, that 
originally it is only given as a germ and that it has de- 
veloped to what it is now through experience in the 
struggle for existence and through sexual selection. 

In so far the knowledge of the Universe as the abso- 
lute truth is, too, an empirical knowledge which, just 
like every other knowledge and like every other thing, is 
given a priori as a germ and originates in the Endlessness. 
Hence it follows that the human mind, which has clearly 
conceived the relation between the universal truth and 
the natural phenomena, will no longer separate in an ex- 
aggerated way the knowledge gained by experience from 
the innate faculty of knowledge, cognition, etc. 

Mysticism of this kkid is not of the nebulous, morbid 
sort such as the one which teaches us that the human 
faculty of cognition is too narrow to know the absolute 
truth. The human intellect is too small to exhaust by 
study the smallest particle as well as the whole of Na- 
ture. But since such inexhaustibility or endlessness is a 
predicate which applies to all things without exception, 
and consequently, to our faculty of cognition also, it is 
sheer humbug to make much capital out of it as was the 
custom until now. 

Morbid mysticism separates unscientifically the abso- 
lute truth from the relative truth. It makes of the phe- 
nomenal thing and of the " thing in itself," that is, of 
the phenomenon and truth, two categories which differ 
completely from each other and are not contained in one 
united category. This nebulous mysticism turns our 



286 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

knowledge and faculty of cognition into mere substitutes 
which have to suggest to us a superhuman monstrous 
mind somewhere in the transcendental heavens. 

Humility is always becoming to man. Yet the state- 
ment of the inability of man to know the truth has a 
double sense, — one that is worthy and one that is un- 
worthy of man. Everything which we know, all scien- 
tific results, all phenomena are parts of the genuine, the 
right, the absolute truth. Though the latter is inexhaust- 
ible and cannot with full perfection be portrayed in 
knowledge or pictured in the mind, yet the pictures, 
which science is able to show of it, are exact pictures 
in the humanly relative sense of the word. Just so the 
sentences which I am now writing down here have an 
exact, rational sense and yet have not, if one likes to per- 
vert or misunderstand them. 

Granted that truth cannot be exhausted by knowledge. 
Still it is not so far removed from our cognition as the 
fantastical mystics assume who are not satisfied with the 
human mind, because they carry about in their head the 
fantasy of a superhuman monstrous mind. 

Scientific cognition must not long after absolute truth 
because that truth is given to us by means of our senses 
as well as of our mind without further search. It is in 
reality the phenomena, the special manifestations of the 
given general truth, which we want to know. Such 
truth readily yields itself to us in its particular phenome- 
non. It is exact pictures, genuine knowledge which our 
cognition has to provide. And the question here deals 
only with relative exactness or completeness. More must 
not be wished for by human reason. This is no resigna- 
tion as the monks recommend. We are able to know the 
truth — it yields to us readily. But it is quite natural 
that we cannot jump out of our skin. It may also be 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 287 

natural that there should be metaphysical and religious 
dreamers who still go about with such an intention. 
Their quest after another absolute truth is a dream which 
the history of human knowledge has left far behind it, 
whilst the modesty which is satisfied with the knowledge 
of relative truth is called rational enlightenment. 

Spinoza says, there is only one substance, — it is uni- 
versal, endless or absolute. All other finite so-called 
substances originate in it, emerge from it and submerge 
in it; they only have a relative, transient, accidental ex- 
istence. All finite things are to Spinoza, and justly so, 
mere modi of the endless substance, as confirmed by our 
modern natural science in its doctrine of the eternity of 
matter and conservation of force. Only in one thing, 
and that a very essential one, Spinoza had to be cor- 
rected by the subsequent philosophy. 

According to Spinoza, the endless, absolute substance 
possesses two attributes : it is infinitely extended and it 
thinks infinitely. Thought and extension are the two 
Spinozist attributes of the absolute substance. This is 
wrong, especially as there is nothing which could sup- 
port the proposition of the absolute thinking. And the 
absolute extension, too, explains very little. The world, 
or the absolute, or Nature, or the Universe, or whatever 
else the thing of things, the One and Infinite is called, 
extend infinitely both in time and space; yet every little 
space of the Space, and every particle of Time as well 
as every other thing which is contained in it, is an indi- 
vidual, changeable, transient, limited thing, and thinking 
forms no exception to this limitation and finity. 

Our present knowledge of the nature of thought and 
thinking far surpasses that of Spinoza in clearness and 
definiteness. We now know that thinking or conscious- 
ness is no mysterious depository of truth, but rather in 



288 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

its true nature possesses no other nature than the natural 
one of which all other things participate. It is as much 
trivial as mysterious, and, though an unlimited object of 
study, yet no more unlimited than any other particular 
matter or force. 

What is called by Spinoza the endless substance, and 
what we call the Universe or the absolute truth, is as 
identical with its finite phenomena, with the relative 
truths which we meet in the Universe, as the forest is 
identical with its trees, or in general, as the species with 
its varieties. The relative and the absolute do not lie so 
far apart as it is painted to man by that uncultivated sense 
of infinity which is called Religion, And the branch 
of study, too, which is called speculative Philosophy was 
permeated by religion and proceeded from that ignorance 
which did not perceive the relative position of the human 
mind to the absolute truth. The branch of study which 
strove after a clear idea of the mind was from its begin- 
ning to the very last classical philosophers biased by in- 
consistent extravagance. It fails to perceive that every- 
thing which is relative, and the faculty of cognition, too, 
is contained in the Absolute precisely in the same way — 
I repeat the analogy — as trees are contained in the for- 
est. It misses the essence of all logic, viz., that all spe- 
cialties without any exception are contained in one spe- 
cies and all species in one general species, the Universe, 
which is the absolute truth. 

Philosophy, like Religion, lived in the belief in a super- 
natural absolute truth. The solution of the problem lies 
in the conception that the absolute truth is nothing but 
the generalized truth, that the latter dwells not in the 
mind — at least, not more than anywhere else — but in 
the object contemplated by the mind, which we designate 
by the general term, the Universe. 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 289 

The transcendental absolute truth which Religion and 
Philosophy used to call God, was a mystification of the 
human mind which in its turn mystified itself with this 
fantastical picture. The philosopher Kant, who dealt 
with the critique of the faculty of cognition, found out 
that man cannot know the transcendental absolute truth. 
We may add : man cannot know the prosaic, every-day 
things, either, in a transcendental absolute manner. 
When, however, he uses his faculty in a sober and rela- 
tive way as one has to consider all circumstances rela- 
tively, as soon as he rids himself of his supernatural 
bias, then everything is to him open and nothing closed, 
and he can also grasp and know the general truth. 

Just as our eye, be it with the assistance of glasses, 
can see everything and yet not everything, since it can 
neither see sounds nor smells, nor, in general, anything 
invisible, so our faculty of cognition can know everything 
and yet not everything. It cannot know the unknowa- 
ble. But this is plainly enough only a fantastical or a 
transcendental desire. 

When we recognize that the absolute truth which was 
sought by Religion and Philosophy in the region of the 
transcendental, is close at hand in its full reality as the 
bodily Universe, and that the human mind is a real, or 
actual and active part of the general truth, having the 
mission to form true pictures of the parts of the general 
truth, then we have the problem of the limited and un- 
limited completely solved. The Absolute and the Rela- 
tive are not separated transcen dentally, they are con- 
nected with each other so that the Unlimited is made up 
of an infinite number of finite limitations and each lim- 
ited phenomenon possesses the nature of the Infinite. 

How and in what way the things said here bear upon 
the passage from Marx quoted at the beginning, that 



290 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

is, upon the true, good and right in political and social 
life, I must leave meanwhile to the reader to find out for 
himself, as a detailed elucidation of it would take up too 
much space here. Perhaps, I may yet find the oppor- 
tunity to return to tEat reference at another time. 1 

1 Find the explanation in the next chapter. — Editor. 



III. 

MATERIALISM VERSUS MATERIALISM. 

" The insight," says Frederic Engels, " gained into the 
utter perversity of the hitherto prevailing German ideal- 
ism led necessarily to materialism, but, of course, not to 
the mere metaphysical materialism of the eighteenth cen- 
tury." 

This modern materialism which is here derived from 
the total perversion of German idealism and of which 
Engels himself is one of the founders, is little under- 
stood, though it forms the fundamental basis of the 
theory of German Social-Democracy. We propose, 
therefore, to make it the subject of a somewhat detailed 
examination. 

This specifically German, or, if you like, Social-Demo- 
cratic materialism, can best be characterized by com- 
paring it with the " metaphysical, exclusively mechanical 
materialism of the 18th century ; " and when we further 
confront it with the German idealism from the perversity 
of which it sprang, the character of the Social-Democratic 
basis, which, owing to its materialist name, is easily ex- 
posed to misrepresentation, must clearly reveal itself. 

And first of all, why does Engels call the materialism 
of the 18th century "metaphysical?" Metaphysicians 
were people who were not satisfied with the physical 
or natural world, but always carried about the idea of a 
supernatural, metaphysical world. Kant in his preface 
to the " Critique of Pure Reason," sums up the problem 

291 



292 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

of metaphysics in three words : God, Freedom and Im- 
mortality. One knows now that God was a spirit, a 
supernatural spirit, who created the natural, physical, 
material world. The celebrated materialists of the 18th 
century were no friends or worshippers of this biblical 
story. The problem of God, Freedom and Immortality, 
so far as it refers to a supernatural world, left those 
atheists thoroughly indifferent. They stuck to the phys- 
ical world and were so far no metaphysicians. 

It is evident that Engels uses the word in a different 
sense. 

Of the primary great mind beyond the clouds the 
French and English materialists of the 18th century had 
disposed completely enough ; but they could not help oc- 
cupying themselves with the secondary human mind. It 
is the difference in the conception of this mind, its nature, 
its origin and its constitution which distinguishes the 
materialists from the idealists. The latter regard the 
human mind and its ideas as children of a supernatural, 
metaphysical world. Still they have not been content 
with the mere belief in such a distant origin, but rather 
strove, since the very days of Socrates and Plato, to sup- 
ply this belief with a scientific basis, to prove it, to eluci- 
date it, just as one proves and elucidates physical things 
of the tangible world. In this way the idealist brought 
the knowledge about the nature of the human mind down 
from the transcendental, metaphysical world to the real, 
physical, material world which reveals itself as a dia- 
lectical or evolutionary process, where mind and matter, 
though two, are yet one, that is, twin children springing 
from one blood, from one mother. 

The idealists originally favored the religious notion 
that the world was created by a spirit. In this they were 
completely wrong, since it finally, as a result of their 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 293 

efforts, became evident that it is precisely the natural 
material world which is the original ; that this was created 
by no spirit, but on the contrary, the natural or material 
world itself is the creator which brought forth and de- 
veloped man with his intellect out of itself. Thus it was 
discovered that the supreme uncreated spirit is but a 
fantastical image of the natural mind which has developed 
in, and together with, the human nervous system and its 
brainy skull. 

Idealism, which derives its name from the circumstance 
that it sets the idea and the ideas, those products of the 
human head, above and before the material world — both 
in point of time and importance, this idealism has started 
very extravagantly and metaphysically. In the course 
of its history, however, this extravagance has toned down 
and become more and more sober till Kant himself an- 
swered the question which he had set out to solve, viz. : 
" Is Metaphysics at all possible as a science ? " in the 
negative ; Metaphysics as a science is not possible ; an- 
other world, that is, a transcendental world can only be 
believed and supposed. Thus the perversion of idealism 
has become already a thing of the past, and modern ma- 
terialism is the result of the philosophical and also of the 
general scientific development. 

Because the idealist perversity in its last representa- 
tives, namely Kant, Fichte, Schelling and Hegel, was 
thoroughly German, its issue, dialectical materialism, is 
also a preeminently German product. 

Idealism derives the corporeal world from the mind, 
quite after the fashion of religion where the great spirit 
floats over the waters and has only to say : " Let there 
be," and it is. Such idealist derivation is metaphysical. 
Yet, as mentioned already, the last great representatives 
of German idealism wefe metaphysicians of a very mod- 



294 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

erate type. They had already emancipated themselves 
considerably from the transcendental, supernatural, heav- 
enly mind, — not, however, from the spell-bound worship 
of the natural mind of the world. The Christians deified 
the mind, and the philosophers were still permeated to 
such an extent with this deification, that they were unable 
to relinquish it — even when the physical human mind 
had already become the sober object of their study — 
making this intellect of ours the creator or parent of the 
material world. They never tire in their efforts to arrive 
at a clear understanding of the relation between our men- 
tal conceptions and the material things which are repre- 
sented, conceived and thought. 

To us, dialectical or Social-Democratic materialists, the 
mental faculty of thinking is a developed product of ma- 
terial Nature, whilst according to the German idealism 
the relation is quite the reverse. That is why Engels 
speaks of the perversity of this mode of thinking. The 
extravagant worship of the mind was the survival of the 
old metaphysics. 

The English and French materialists of the 18th cen- 
tury were, so to speak, too hasty opponents of this sort 
of worship. This over-hastiness prevented them from 
emancipating themselves from it thoroughly. They were 
extravagantly radical and fell into the opposite perversity. 
Just as the philosophic idealists were worshipping the 
mind and the mental, so were the materialists worship- 
ping the body and the corporeal. The idealist over- 
estimated the idea, the materialist matter, both were 
dreamers and in so far metaphysicians, both distinguished 
mind and matter in a fantastic, unreal way. Neither of 
them raised themselves to the consciousness of unity and 
monism, generality and universality of Nature which is 






EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 295 

not either material or mental, but is one as well as the 
other. 

The metaphysical materialists of the 18th century and 
their present followers — for there are still some of them 
among us — undervalue the human mind and the inquiry 
into the constitution and its proper use just as much as 
the idealists overvalue them. They, the materialists, pro- 
claim, for instance, that the forces of Nature are prop- 
erties of matter, and that especially the mental force, the 
force of thought, is the property of brain. Matter or 
the material, i. e., the ponderable and the tangible, is in 
their eyes the main thing in the world, the primary sub- 
stance, while the mental energy, like all non-tangible 
energies, is but a secondary property. In other words, 
ponderable matter is to the old materialists the exalted 
subject, and all other things subordinate predicates. 

There is in this mode of thinking an exaggeration of 
the importance of the subject and a disparagement of the 
predicate. The fact is lost sight of that the relation be- 
tween the subject and the predicate is a variable one. 
The human mind may legitimately turn every predicate 
into a subject, and vice versa, every subject into a predi- 
cate. The snow-white color is, if not tangible, at least 
as substantial as the color-white snow. To think that 
matter is the substance or the main thing, and its predi- 
cates or properties are mere subordinate appendices, is an 
antiquated, narrow way of thinking which has taken no 
notice of the work of the German dialecticians. It must 
now be understood that subjects are composed exclusive- 
ly of predicates. 

The statement that thought is a secretion, a product of 
the brain, as bile is a secretion of the liver, tells us some- 
thing that is unquestionable. Yet, it must be confessed 
that the analogy is a very bad, a faulty one. The liver, 



296 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

the subject of this observation, is something tangible 
and ponderable ; likewise the bile which is said to be the 
predicate or the effect of the liver. In this illustration 
both the subject and the predicate, both the liver and the 
bile, are ponderable and tangible, and it is this circum- 
stance which conceals what the materialists wish to con- 
vey when they represent the bile as the effect and the 
liver as the superior cause. We must therefore specially 
emphasize what in this case is not at all disputed, but 
what in the relation between the brain and mental energy 
is entirely lost sight of, — namely, that the bile is not so 
much the effect of the liver as the effect of the life-proc- 
ess as a whole. In the life-process of human nature as 
in the cosmic life-process of the natural Universe the 
liver and the bile are of equal standing and equally subor- 
dinate, equally cause and equally effect, equally subject 
and equally predicate. 

By saying that bile is a product of the liver the ma- 
terialists do not in the least wish to deny that both are 
of equal value as subjects of scientific research. When, 
however, it is stated that consciousness, the faculty of 
cognition, is a property of the brain, the tangible subject 
appears to them as the sole object worthy of study, while 
the mental predicate is a mere settled thing as it were. 

We call this mode of thinking of mechanical material- 
ism narrow because it makes the tangible and the pon- 
derable the subject, the depositary of all properties, and 
that to such an extent as to overlook entirely that in the 
Universe the transcendentally extolled palpability plays 
precisely the same subordinate predicative part as every 
other subordinate subject of General Nature. 

The relation between subject and predicate explains 
neither matter nor thought. Still jn order to elucidate 
the connection between the brain and the mental energy 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 297 

it is necessary to elucidate the connection between subject 
and predicate. 

We shall, perhaps, come nearer to the point, if we 
select another example, an example where the subject is 
material, but the predicate is such as makes it at least 
doubtful, whether it is material or mental. If, for in- 
stance, the legs walk, the eyes see, the ears hear, it is 
questionable whether the subject and its predicate belong 
together to the domain of the material ; whether the light 
which is seen, the sound which is heard, and the move- 
ment which is effected by the legs are something ma- 
terial or immaterial. The eyes, ears, and legs are tangi- 
ble and ponderable subjects, while the predicates — r vision 
and its light, hearing and its sound, movement and its 
steps (apart from the legs which do the pacing) can 
neither be touched nor weighed. 

Now, how great or small is the conception of matter? 
Do colors, light, sound, space, time, heat and electricity 
belong to it, or must we relegate them to a different cate- 
gory? With the formal distinction between subjects and 
predicates, things and properties, causes and effects, the 
question is by no means disposed of. When the eye sees, 
the palpable eye is, of course, the subject. But one is 
also justified to reverse the expression and to say, that the 
imponderable vision, the forces of light and vision are 
the main things, the subjects, while the material eye is 
a mere instrument, a secondary thing, attribute or predi- 
cate. 

So much is evident : matter has no greater importance 
than the forces, and the forces have no greater impor- 
tance than matter. Materialism is narrow when it gives 
matter the preference and waxes in enthusiasm over the 
material at the expense of the forces. Those who assume 
the forces to be mere properties or predicates of matter 



298 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

are badly informed of the relativity, or the variability of 
the difference between substance and property. 

The conception of matter and the material has hitherto 
been very confused. Just as the lawyers cannot agree 
as to the first day of life of the child in the womb, or as 
the philologists continually dispute what is to be taken 
as the beginning of speech, whether the alluring cries and 
love songs of birds are speech or not, or whether speech 
by mimics or gestures are of the same category as vocal 
speech, so also do the materialists of the old school con- 
tinually dispute as to what is matter, — whether it is 
merely the tangible and ponderable which ought to be 
regarded as such, or also the visible, smellable, audible 
and finally the whole Nature, including even the human 
mind which is also an object of study, namely, of episte- 
mology. 

We see, the distinguishing mark between the mechan- 
ical materialists of the 18th century and the Social-Demo- 
cratic materialists trained in German idealism consists 
in that the latter have extended the former's narrow con- 
ception of matter as consisting exclusively of the Tangi- 
ble to all phenomena that occur in the world. 

There is nothing to say against the transcendental ma- 
terialists distinguishing between the tangible and pon- 
derable, on the one hand, and the smellable, audible and 
visible and even the world of thought, on the other. We 
only object to their carrying this distinction beyond rea- 
sonable bounds, failing thereby to see the common and 
kindred nature of things or properties, — in other words, 
we object to their distinction becoming metaphysical, 
thereby missing the significance of the common category 
which embraces all opposites and contrasts. 

The old materialists dealt in irreconcilable opposites 
just like the perverted idealists. Both place cognition 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 299 

and its material too far from each other, they magnify 
the opposition in an unnatural manner, and that is why 
Engels calls their mode of thinking " metaphysical." 
An example to illustrate this is the common way of 
thinking which forgets that death which concludes life 
is but an act of life and stands in the same connected 
relation with life as might be seen in the opposition be- 
tween word and deed where a little thought will show 
that word is, after all, deed too — words are ideas em- 
bodied by an act of will — thus confirming our view that 
" metaphysical " distinctions are inadmissible. 

Modern science is even to-day still animated by the 
bias of the materialists of the 18th century. These ma- 
terialists were the general theoreticians, the philosophers 
of natural science, so to speak, in so far as the latter 
confines its study to the mechanical, that is the palpable, 
the ponderable and tangible. Natural science, of course, 
has begun long since to overstep these limits. Already 
Chemistry has led beyond the narrow boundaries of the 
mechanical, and the same is now being done in Physics 
by the theory of the conservation and transformation of 
energy. With all that, however, science is narrow and 
wanting in penetration, it still lacks a systematic theory 
of the Universe as an infinite monistic evolutionary proc- 
ess. The study of the human mind and of all those rela- 
tions which cognition has effected in human history, that 
is, the things political, judicial, economical, etc., all this 
natural science excludes from its province, still laboring 
under the delusion that mind is something metaphysical, 
is a child of another world and not subject to the laws 
governing the Universe. 

Science deserves that reproach not because it separates 
the mechanical, chemical, electro-technical and other 
knowledge from one another and constitutes them special 



300 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

branches; this is quite legitimate; our reproach is only 
directed against the metaphysical mode of thinking in 
which science is caught, as it were, in a straight- jacket, as 
is evidenced by its hard and fast distinctions and by its 
absolute separation of matter from mind. It is only in 
so far as it does not perceive that Politics, Logic, History, 
Law, and Economics — in short, all mental relations are 
natural and scientific relations, that it together with the 
mechanical materialists and the German idealists still re- 
mains in the metaphysical, that is in the transcendental 
stage. 

It is not what one thinks of the stars or animals, 
plants or stones that distinguishes materialists from 
idealists; the characteristic point is solely and only the 
respective view of the relation between body and mind. 

The insight into the total perversity of German ideal- 
ism which would not desist from regarding mind as a 
metaphysical primus creating all tangible, visible, audible 
and other phenomena, led necessarily to the Socialist Ma- 
terialism which is called " Socialist " because it was the 
Socialists Marx and Engels who first enunciated clearly 
and distinctly that the material, that is, the economic con- 
ditions of human society form the basis from which the 
entire superstructure of the juridical and political institu- 
tions as well as the religious, philosophical and other 
modes of thought are at each historical epoch in the last 
instance explained. Instead of explaining, as hitherto, 
the existence of man out of his consciousness, it is now, 
on the contrary, the consciousness which is to be ex- 
plained out of his existence, that is, from the economic 
position, from the way and manner of bread-winning. 

The Socialist materialism understands by matter not 
only the ponderable and tangible, but the whole real ex- 
istence. Everything that is contained in the Universe — 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 301 

and in it is contained everything, the All and the Uni- 
verse being but two names for one thing — everything 
this Socialist materialism embraces in one conception, 
one name, one category, whether that category be called 
the actuality, reality, Nature or matter. 

We, modern Socialists, are not of the narrow opinion 
that the ponderable and tangible matter is matter par 
excellence. We hold that the scent of flowers, 
sounds and smells are also material. We do not con- 
ceive the forces as mere appendices, mere predicates of 
matter, and matter, the tangible one as "the thing " 
which dominates over all properties. Our conception 
of matter and force is, so to speak, democratic. One is 
of the same value as the other; everything individual is 
but the property, appendix, predicate or attribute of the 
entire Nature as a whole. The brain is not the matador 
and the mental functions are not the subordinate servants. 
No, we modern materialists assert that the function is as 
much and as little an independent thing as the tangible 
brain-mass or any other materiality. The thoughts, too, 
their origin and nature, are just as real matters and ma- 
terials worthy of study as any. 

We are materialists because we do not make of mind a 
metaphysical monstrosity. The force of thinking is to 
us just as little a " thing in itself " as gravity or a clod. 
All things are merely links of the great universal con- 
nection which alone is durable, true, subsisting and thus 
more than a phenomenon, indeed, the only " thing in 
itself " and the absolute truth. 

Because we Socialist materialists have only one inter- 
related conception of matter and mind, the so-called 
mental relations such as those of politics, religion, morals, 
etc., are to us also material conditions ; and material labor 
and the bread-and-butter question are only in so far 



302 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

regarded by us as the basis, the perquisite and foundation 
of all mental development as the animal element is prior 
in point of time to the human one — which does not 
prevent us from valuing man and his intellect very 
highly. 

Socialist materialism is distinguished by the fact that 
it does not undervalue the human mind as the old mate- 
rialists did, nor over-value it as the German idealists did. 
It proceeds in its appreciation in a moderate manner and 
regards both Mechanics and Philosophy from the stand- 
point of critical dialectics, namely as interrelated phe- 
nomena of the inseparable world-process and world-prog* 
ress. 

In his " General Morphology " Ernst Haeckel says : 
" The general and rapid advancement made by Geology 
and Botany in consequence of the extraordinary services 
rendered by Linnaeus to the systematic knowledge of 
animals and plants, led to the erroneous assumption that 
the systems themselves were the aim of science and that 
it was only necessary to enrich the system with as many 
new forms as possible in order to render durable service 
to the cause of zoological and botanical sciences. It 
was thus that there arose the great and melancholy host 
of zoologists of the Museum and botanists of the 
Herbarium who could distinguish by their names each 
of the thousands of species, but at the same time had not 
the slightest knowledge of the rougher and more delicate 
structural conditions of these species, of their develop- 
ment and life-history, of their physiological and anatomi- 
cal conditions. . . . We must, however, point out the 
singular delusion under which modern Biology labors 
when it advertises in glowing terms as scientific Zoology 
and scientific Botany the bare mechanical description of 
the inner and delicate, especially microscopical, form-rela- 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 303 

tions and compares this, not without pride, with the pure 
description of the external and rougher form-relations, 
which was exclusively prevalent in former times and 
which is the chief occupation of the so-called sys- 
tematizes. As long as these two schools, which are 
fond of contrasting themselves so sharply, are aiming 
at description only (whether of the external or internal, 
the delicate or the rougher forms, does not matter) the 
one is worth just as much as the other. Both of them 
can only rise to the level of science when they try to 
explain the form and trace the law underlying it. 
In our firm conviction, the reaction which was sooner 
or later bound to come against this totally one-sided and 
narrow empiricism, has in fact already begun. Darwin's 
discovery, given to the world in 1859, of the natural 
selection in the struggle for existence — one of the great- 
est discoveries of the human mind — has with one stroke 
turned such a fierce and clear light upon the obscure 
mass of the gradually accumulated biological facts that 
even the most obstinate empiricists — if they wish to keep 
pace with science at all — will in future no longer be able 
to avoid the new Natural Philosophy which arose as a 
consequence of it." 

We quote these words of Haeckel, one of the most re- 
nowned naturalists of the time, to show what his attitude 
is to the old question : what is science ? What must we 
do in order to understand, to study, to explain stones, 
plants, animals, men and human instincts? Man pos- 
sesses in his head an active faculty which is engaged in 
this work of elucidation. It is the different ideas, opin- 
ions and views on this active faculty — otherwise called 
mind, intellect, reason, faculty of cognition — which di- 
vide the old and new Materialists as well as the Idealists 
into different camps. These parties all differ between them 



304 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

as to the mind and the way in which this mind arrives 
at science and how science must be constituted. 

In natural science there is comparatively little differ- 
ence of opinion on this subject, yet, as we have just heard 
from Hseckel, sufficient to arouse a lively discussion as 
to what is science and what is not. Classical, however, 
the controversy becomes only in the so-called " phi- 
losophical " branches of knowledge which deal with the 
doctrines and lives of the teachers of religion, of states- 
men, politicians, jurists, sociologists, economists, etc., 
that is, with the most vital interests of human society. 
It is there that one is first to perceive to the full extent 
the import which attaches to what one thinks of the 
human mind and of the influence which a solid method 
of thinking, or, in fact, a theory of it has for human 
society. 

No doubt, natural science knows how to use the hu- 
man mind, — its successes are proof of that. But these 
same naturalists are also sometimes engaged in dis- 
cussing politics, religion, socialism, etc., and though they 
know how to use their brains scientifically in their own 
province, this habitual use is not sufficient for purposes 
of solving successfully problems which arise in other do- 
mains. We, therefore, believe to have proved by this 
fact that we are justified in proceeding with our inquiry 
into the nature of the faculty of thinking and into the 
proper and successful mode of its application. 

As we don't agree with the old materialists who 
thought that they had sufficiently explained the intellect 
by calling it the property of the brain, we cannot hope 
for a solution of the problem by subjecting the human 
mind to an anatomical dissection. Nor can the specu- 
lative way which expects to find out the nature of the 
mind by rummaging in the interior of the head, be ours 






EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 3O5 

because such idealist speculation has achieved altogether 
too little. Thus comes opportunely Haeckel with his 
opinion about the proper method of science. He con- 
templates the human mind, and how it worked histori- 
cally, and this appears to us to be the right method. 

Every natural product behaves with a peculiarity of 
its own; the stone remains stationary, and the wind 
travels from land to land. Nor is the mind a thing that 
can be got hold of at a certain place; true, we feel its 
activity in our head, but it does not remain there ; it issues 
forth into the wide world and there it combines, if not 
chemically, still as a matter of fact with all objects of 
the universal Nature. As little as the wind can be sepa- 
rated from the air, can our mind be separated from the 
other natural objects; it only manifests itself as a phe- 
nomenon in mental combination with such natural things. 
Without the natural combination with other material the 
mind is not to be had. It is probably not a chemical 
element which can be produced in a pure state. And 
why should everything be chemical? 

And so the mind knows something of plants and ani- 
mals. Botany and Zoology are mental combinations. In 
natural sciences — generally speaking, in everything which 
we know positively — the human mind is naturally com- 
bined with the respective material things and is only 
to be conceived and represented in such combinations. 

Now, Haeckel tells us of the melancholy host of zoolo- 
gists of the Museum and botanists of the Herbarium and 
explains that the method in which they combined their 
mind with animals and plants was not the right one. 
And the succeeding scientists, too, who studied the more 
delicate and inner structures microscopically, but still 
confined themselves to mere description of the objects, 
did not know how to bring about the right combination 



306 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

between the subject and the object, mind and matter. 
It was only the discovery of the natural selection 
through the struggle for existence, given to the world by 
Darwin in 1859, which was a proper mental combina- 
tion — so Haeckel thinks, and we take the liberty to 
differ. 

Let not the reader misunderstand us. We do not 
dispute that Darwin and Haeckel have correctly and in a 
scientific way combined their individual minds with the 
vegetable and animal kingdom and produced clear crys- 
tals of knowledge. We merely want to call the attention 
to modern dialectical materialism which is of opinion 
that Darwin and Haeckel, however high their merits are, 
were not the first and not the only ones who produced 
such crystals. Even the melancholy zoologists of the 
Museum and the botanists of the Herbarium left us a 
good slice of science. The arrangement of the vegetable 
and animal kingdoms in classes, species and varieties 
according to different characters was a fully justified sci- 
entific combination of mind and matter, " bare descrip- 
tion'' though it was. Without thoughts it could not 
have been done. Certainly Darwin has done more; but 
still nothing but more. He added to the old a new 
light, but his light was by no means a different light from 
that of Linnaeus. Darwin uses the " many accumulated 
biological facts " and adds some new ones ; he describes 
Embryology and how by means of natural selection the 
changes are inherited and how these inherited changes 
by means of the struggle for existence become stronger, 
and so intermediate forms and new varieties arise. By 
means of observation and accumulation of facts and their 
description a new light is gained or, rather, the light 
gained previously is increased. The service rendered by 
Darwin is great, but not so overwhelming as to justify 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 2p1 

laeckel in making this " science " something higher than 
Wie everyday combination of the human mind with thtf 
objective facts. 

We have already pointed out in our first article that 
the narrow materialism not only considers mind a prop- 
erty of the brain — a proposition which nobody dis- 
putes — but infers from that directly or indirectly that 
the faculty of reasoning or of knowledge predicated of 
the brain was not a substantive object of study, so that the 
study of the material brain yielded sufficient informa- 
tion of the mental property and force. As against this, 
our dialectic materialism proves that the question ought 
to be considered after the precept of Spinoza from the 
standpoint of the Universe, sub specie cetemitatis. In 
the endless Universe matter in the oense of the old and 
antiquated materialists, that is, of tangible matter, does 
not possess the slightest preferential right to be more 
substantial, i. e., more immediate, more distinct and more 
certain than any other phenomenon of Nature. 

It is an essential broadening of our sphere of knowl- 
edge to conceive the material subject, the brain, together 
with its mental predicate, that is, both the brain and the 
mind, as mere properties or phenomena or changes of the 
absolute subject, the natural Nature which has no other 
nature besides, or above or outside. This conception re- 
strains the extravagance with which materialists extoll 
their matter, and idealists their function of the brain to 
the skies. 

Those materialists who make tangible matter the sub- 
stance and the intangible function of the brain a mere 
incidence think too little of this function. In order to 
gain a more adequate and just idea of it, it is above all 
necessary to go back to the fact that they are children 
of one mother, that they are two natural phenomena on 



308 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

which we turn a light when we describe them and arrange 
them in classes, species and sub-species 

When we declare as regards matter — and nobody will 
dispute it — that it is a phenomenon of Nature and state 
the same with regard to the mental faculty of man, then, 
of course, we still know very little of them. Yet so 
much we do know that they are twin-children, that no- 
body must separate them to any extravagant extent, that 
nobody must draw between them a distinction toto genere, 
toto coelo. 

If we wish now, for instance, to know something more 
of matter, then we must do as the zoologists of the Mu- 
seum and the botanists of the Herbarium did once upon 
a time, — we must try to ascertain, to study and to de- 
scribe its different classes, families and varieties, how 
they rise, pass away and change into one another. This 
is the science of matter. Whoever wishes for more 
wishes something transcendental, and does not under- 
stand what knowledge means, does not understand either 
the organ of knowledge or its use. When the old ma- 
terialists deal with special matters, they behave quite 
scientifically; but when they have to deal with abstract 
matter, with its general conception, then their helpless- 
ness in the science of knowledge stands revealed. It is 
precisely the merit of the idealists that they at least have 
advanced the use of abstractions and general ideas to an 
extent which enabled modern socialist materialism to 
recognize at last, that matter and conception are ordinary 
products of Nature and that there is not and cannot be 
anything which does not wholly belong to the one and 
only absolute category of the natural world. 

Our materialism is distinguished by its special knowl- 
edge of the common nature of mind and matter. 
Wherever this modern materialism takes up the human 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EP1STEMOLOGY 309 

mind as an object of study, it treats it like any other 
object of study, consequently like the zoologists of the 
Museum, the botanists of the Herbarium and the Dar- 
winists treat the knowledge and description of their ob- 
jects. Unquestionably, the former have by their classi- 
fication thrown a light upon the thousands of their ob- 
jects. Perhaps that light was not a very strong light and 
Darwin strengthened it in a way which made the addi- 
tional light outshine the original one. Yet, the old 
" describers " had to " know " before they could classify, 
and Darwin's knowledge itself was nothing but a de- 
scription guided by the conception of evolution and 
yielding, by a description of the natural proceedings, a 
more adequate picture of the accumulated facts. 

With all that, the old zoologists and botanists were 
narrow-minded interpreters : they interpreted the varieties 
of the animal and vegetable kingdoms merely as regards 
their contiguity, and failed to see their evolutionary 
process. To have drawn within the limits of his ob- 
servation the historical transformation constitutes in the 
main the merit of Darwin. It is impossible to deny the 
fact that it was Darwin's science which first illuminated 
the results gained by the zoologists of the Museum. 
Still, the same will also happen to modern natural sci- 
ence : future discoveries will enlarge those already made, 
will consequently make them always more and more valu- 
able. Nothing and nobody can pose as the only true 
solution, but everything is to be considered from the 
standpoint of the Universe. 

The materialist theory of knowledge amounts, then, to 
this statement, that the human organ of cognition radi- 
ates no metaphysical light, but is a piece of Nature 
which pictures other pieces of Nature whose essence 
is explained when we describe it and bring it in connec- 



3IO PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

tion with the whole Universe as the one Reality and the 
real Unity. Such a description demands from the 
epistemologist or philosopher that he should treat his 
subject in the same precise way as the animal world is 
treated by the zoologist. Should I be reproached with 
not following this precept immediately, I would point 
to Rome which, too, was not built in one day. 

It is remarkable how those enlightened naturalists, 
who know so well that the eternal movement of Nature 
has through adaptation, selection, struggle for existence, 
etc., produced elephants and apes out of protoplasma and 
molluscs, should be reluctant to acknowledge that mind 
has developed in the same way. Why should not reason 
be able to accomplish what bone did? But true, bones 
did not do it, and reason cannot do it. It is the substan- 
tial force of the Universe, in which they participate, which 
has brought about the things that are, and all that the 
human mind can do is to form a picture of its gradual, 
consistent and rational working. Why does it wish fot 
more? It only wishes for more because and in so far as 
it is too exacting and extravagant a taskmaster. 

When we say not only of reason, but also of Nature 
in general that it is rational, we do not wish to convey 
the idea that this rational Nature and its working are 
the predetermined and purposeful work of a fantastic 
mind. Nature, which could develop the human reason, is 
such an astounding thing that it requires no central organ 
for its rational development. Wonderful Nature is not- 
robbed of its wonderfulness by our " knowledge," " cog' 
nition," " interpretation " ; it may, however, by a closer 
description or an adequate picture, well be freed from all 
transcendentalism, from all mystification, — nay, inter- 
preted and grasped, in so far as one does not form ar 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 3II 

exaggerated idea of those mental functions, but gains a 
true conception thereof. 

Just as the zoologist of the Museum got to know his 
animals by description of the class, species and family 
in which they have been arranged, so is also the human 
mind to be studied through rinding the different varieties 
of the mind. Every person has an intellect of his own 
which together with those of all others must be con- 
sidered as blossoms of the general mind. This general 
human mind has, like the individual one, its develop- 
ment partly behind, partly before it ; it has had and will 
have to undergo different and manifold metamorphoses, 
and if we follow those back to the beginning of mankind 
we arrive at a stage where the divine spark manifests 
itself but dimly in bestiality. The bestialized human 
mind forms there the bridge to the animal mind proper, 
then to the mind of plants, to the spirits of the wood 
and mountains. In other words: in this manner we ar- 
rive at the understanding that between mind and matter 
as well as between all parts of the universal unity of 
Nature there are but gradual and hardly perceptible 
transition-stages, but no metaphysical differences. 

It is because the old materialism did not understand 
this fact; because it was unable to conceive the ideas 
of matter and mind as but abstract pictures of concrete 
phenomena ; because in spite of its religious free-thought, 
in spite of its disparagement of the divine mind, it did 
not know what to do with the natural mind and was on 
account of such ignorance unable to overcome meta- 
physics, — it is because of all that that Engels called this 
materialism metaphysical, and the materialism of Social- 
Democracy, which has received a better schooling through 
the preceding German idealism, the dialectical. 

In the eyes of this latter kind of materialism the mind 



312 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

is a collective name for the mental phenomena, as matter 
is a collective name for the material phenomena, ani the 
two together figure under the idea and name of the phe- 
nomena of Nature. This is a new epistemological mode 
of thinking which applies to all special sciences, to all 
special thoughts, and puts forward the principle that all 
things in the world are to be considered sub specie ceter- 
nitatis, from the standpoint of the Universe. This eter- 
nal Universe is so combined with its temporal phenomena 
that all eternity is temporal, all temporality is eternal. 

The substantiated mode of thinking of Social-De- 
mocracy throws thereby a new light upon the old prob- 
lem with which idealism was afflicted, namely, how can 
we think truly, how is the subjective thought to be dis- 
tinguished from the objective? The answer is: thou 
shalt not distinguish transcendentally ; even the most exact 
representation, even the truest thought can only give you 
a picture of the universal varieties which exist within 
and outside you. It is not at all so difficult to distinguish 
realistic pictures from the fantastical, and every artist 
can do it with the utmost precision. The fantastical 
ideas are borrowed from reality, and the most exact ideav 
of reality are necessarily animated by a breath of fam 
tasy. Exact representation and ideas render us excellent 
services precisely because they do not possess an ideal 
exactness, but only a moderate one. . 

Our thoughts cannot and must not agree with thei.' 
objects in an exaggerated, metaphysical sense of the 
word. What we desire and may and should desire, is to 
gain an approximate idea of reality. Hence, also reality 
can only approach our ideals. There can be, outside th* 
idea, no mathematical point, no mathematical straight 
line. In reality all straight lines contain an admixture 
of crookedness, just as even the highest justice must stilf 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 313 

contain a grain of injustice. Truth is of a substantial 
nature and not of an ideal one; it is materialistic; it is 
not to be conceived through thoughts alone, but also 
through the eyes, ears and hands ; it is not a product of 
thought, but on the contrary, the thought is a product of 
universal life. The living Universe is incarnate truth. 



IV. 

DARWIN AND HEGEL. 

It is well known that philosophers have often thrown 
out ideas far in advance of their time which subsequently 
found their verification in the exact sciences. Thus, for 
instance, Descartes is well known to physicists, Leibnitz 
to mathematicians, Kant to physical geographers. It may 
be generally said that philosophers enjoy the reputation 
of having influenced by their ingenious anticipations the 
progress of science. We wish to point out thereby that 
philosophy and natural science do not at all lie inordi- 
nately far apart. It is the same human mind which works 
in the one as in the other science by the same method. 
The method of natural science is more exact, but only 
gradually so, not substantially. There is in every sort 
of knowledge, even in natural science, a certain amount 
of obscure, mysterious "matter," a matter of cognition, 
alongside the luminous and palpable one and even the 
most ingenious anticipations of our philosophers are, in 
spite, or rather because of, their mysterious nature, still 
" natural." To have worked with success at a certain 
conciliation between the natural and the mental is the 
common merit of Darwin and Hegel. 

We wish to render the now almost forgotten Hegel 
what is to due to him as the forerunner of Darwin. 
Mendelssohn, in a dispute with Lessing, called Spinoza 
a " dead dog." Just as dead appears now Hegel, who in 
his time, in the words of his biographer Haym, achieved 

3i4 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EP1STEMOLOGY 315 

in the world of letters a position analogous to that of 
Napoleon I. in the political. Spinoza has long since un- 
dergone resurrection from the state of a " dead dog," 
and so will Hegel, too, find his merits acknowledged by 
future generations. If he has lost his influence at the 
present time, it is merely a temporary eclipse 

Hegel, it is known, once said that of his numerous 
disciples only one understood him and that one, too, 
misunderstood him. That such a general misunderstand- 
ing is more to be ascribed to the obscurity of the master 
than to the lack of understanding in the disciples, admits, 
of course, of no question. Hegel cannot be thoroughly 
understood because he did not understand himself thor- 
oughly. With all that he is an ingenious anticipator of 
Darwin's theory of evolution, and with equal justice and 
truth one may say the reverse: Darwin is an ingenious 
interpreter of Hegel's theory of knowledge. The latter 
is a doctrine of evolution which embraces not only the 
origin of species of the entire animal world, but also the 
origin and development of all things. It is altogether a 
cosmical theory of evolution. We have as little right 
to blame Hegel for his obscurity as Darwin for not hav- 
ing exhausted all knowledge with regard to the origin 
of species. 

Truly and surely who explains everything, explains 
nothing. From such fantastical desire the great philoso- 
pher was quite free, though his school was ready enough 
to worship him. Many Hegelians really believed in their 
time that the master could furnish them the absolute 
knowledge, and that it was only necessary to open one's 
mouth and swallow it. Still we also had such disciples 
who proceeded with earnest labors on the inherited soil 
and brought forth glorious fruit on the tree of knowl- 
edge. 



316 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Let us be critical towards God and all men, Hegel and 
Darwin included. Darwin's theory of evolution has its 
indestructible merits. Who will deny it? Still a Ger- 
man, who has been brought up under the influence of his 
great philosophers, must not forget that the great Dar- 
win was much smaller than his doctrine. How anxiously 
careful is he, not to draw the necessary conclusions ! No 
one can overvalue the worth of exact research ; but who- 
ever does not perceive that it must be accompanied, if 
not by a flight into the Endless, at least by an endless 
flight, by a continuous soaring, does not understand the 
full value of exact experimental inquiry. 

The theory of evolution which we will not say was 
solved, but was considerably stimulated and advanced by 
Hegel, received before all at the hands of Darwin an 
exceedingly valuable application or specification in relation 
to zoology. Still we must not lose sight of the fact that 
the specification was of no greater value than the gereral- 
ization in which Hegel excels; the one cannot and must 
not be without the other. The naturalist combines the 
two, and no philosopher who deserves the name will fail 
do so, either ; it is only the more or the less which is char- 
acteristic for the two branches of knowledge. True, the 
necessity of specialization would sometimes be forgotten 
by the best philosophers; it may not even come to their 
consciousness in any clear form at all.. But just as often 
would exact science forget the general aspect of its work, 
while it was not the worst investigators in the scientific 
domain who sometimes ventured on too bold a flight to 
the skies. The sporadic cloud-soaring of natural science 
and the exact anticipations of philosophers should prove 
to the reader that the General and the Special harmonize 
together. 

All art is natural art, — despite the usual opinion which 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 2> l 7 

places Nature and Art at an over great distance from each 
other; and likewise all science, philosophy included, is 
science of Nature. Speculative philosophy, too, has its 
exact object, namely, " the problem of cognition." It 
would, however, be rendering the philosophers too much 
credit if we were to say that they have solved their 
problem. Other branches of knowledge, especially those 
of natural science, have cooperated; for science of all 
branches, of all nations and of all the times is the general 
result of a closely connected cooperation. The philoso- 
phers have assisted the naturalists, natural science has 
helped philosophy until the problem of knowledge is now 
developed, revealed and clearly worked out. 

There is no question as to what ought to be the name 
of the subject-matter which is studied by the physician 
or astronomer, whilst the subject-matter of philosophy 
was at first much disputed so that one might say that 
the philosophers did not know what they wanted. Now 
at last, after thousands of years of incessant philosophic 
development, it came to be recognized that the " Problem 
of Cognition " or " Theory of Science " has been the 
object and the result of philosophic work. 

In order to understand clearly the relation between 
Hegel and Darwin we are bound to touch upon the deep- 
est and most obscure questions of science. The subject- 
matter of philosophy is just one of those. Darwin's 
subject-matter is undoubted. He knew his object; yet 
it is to be observed that Darwin who knew his object 
wanted to investigate it, — consequently did not know it 
through and through. Darwin investigated his object, 
" the Origin of Species," but he did not exhaust it. This 
means that the subject-matter of every science is endless. 
Whether one wants to measure the Infinite or merely 
the smallest atom, one always has to deal with the Im- 



3l8 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

measurable. Nature, both as a whole and in its parts, 
is inexhaustible, not knowable to its last particle, — con- 
sequently without beginning and end. 

The recognition of this every-day Infinitude is the 
result of science, although the latter started from a trans- 
cendental religious or metaphysical Infinitude. 

Darwin's subject-matter is just as endless and un- 
knowable to the very last particle as Hegel's. The one 
inquired into the origin of species, the other into the 
process of human thinking. The result in both cases was 
the doctrine of evolution. 

We have to deal here v/ith two very great men and 
with a very great thing. We try to show that these 
men did not work in opposition to each other, but in the 
same direction, on the same line. They have raised the 
monistic conception of the world to a height and strength- 
ened it with positive discoveries that up till then were 
unknown. 

Darwin's doctrine of evolution is confined to the animal 
species, and removes the rigid lines which the religious 
conception of the world sets up between the classes and 
species of living creatures. Darwin emancipates science 
from the religious class conception and ejects divine crea- 
tion from science in respect to this special r point. In this 
point he puts in the place of the transcendental creation 
the matter-of-fact self-development. To prove that Dar- 
win did not fall from the clouds it is but necessary to 
remember Lamarck who disputes with Darwin the honor 
of priority. This, however does not diminish the service 
rendered to science by Darwin; whilst Lamarck can lay 
claim to the philosophical anticipation, Darwin can claim 
the specified proofs. 

To our Hegel belongs the honor of having placed the 
self-development of Nature on the broadest basis, of 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 319 

having emancipated knowledge from the class-view in 
the most general way. Darwin criticises the traditional 
class-view zoologically, and Hegel universally. 

Science makes its way out of the darkness to light. 
Philosophy, too, which aims at the illumination of the 
process of human thinking, made its way upwards; that 
it pursued its object rather instinctively than otherwise 
became by the time of Hegel tolerably patent to it. 

The main works of philosophy move about the " meth- 
od," the critical use of reason, the doctrine of science or 
of truth, the way and manner in which man thinks, in 
which he should use his head. It was the aim of phi- 
losophy to inform itself of the special piece of the universe 
which serves as an instrument of the illumination of the 
universe. 

We draw special attention to the dualism, to the double 
problem in this endeavor: the Universe was to be illu- 
minated and at the same time the lamp, by means of 
which it was to be illuminated. It is preeminently this 
double problem which confuses the work of philosophy. 
Science starts from the desire of illumination and does 
not know at first what to take hold of, whether the Cos- 
mos as a whole, or gradually and piecemeal. Many a 
time it had already entered the practical road without 
having arrived at any guiding principle. In the time of 
Hegel the problem was as yet to a large extent obscure, 
still the way had been considerably cleared. It was Kant 
who desisted from the direct search after the whole wis- 
dom of the world and took up, at first, specially the piece 
of the Universe called thinking. This piece, according to 
tradition, belonged preeminently to the metaphysical class 
of the transcendental things. Kant by his critique has 
done enough to emancipate the intellect from this sinister 
class-character. Had he succeeded in this completely, 



320 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

had he proved to us entirely that Reason is a thing which 
together with other things belongs to the same natural 
series, he would have, like Darwin, delivered a crushing 
blow against the transcendental way of classification as 
well as against Religion. No doubt, Kant has done so, 
but he did not cleanly cut off the ear of Malchus and left 
therefore still some work to his successors. 

Hegel was an excellent successor to Kant. When we 
place those two side by side, the one illustrates the other, 
and the two illustrate Darwin. Kant chose Reason as 
his special object of study. In dealing with it he could 
not help drawing other things within his circle of re- 
search. He studies Reason as it behaves in the active 
pursuit of other sciences; he studies it in its relation to 
the rest of the world and tells us a hundred times that it 
is limited to experience, to one indivisible world which is 
temporal and at the same time eternal. Hence it ought 
to be clear to the reader that in the teaching of Kant 
general knowledge of the world and special critique of 
Reason are united. 

It is clear at a glance that Kant's discovery of the 
limitation of human Reason by experience was both phil- 
osophic science and scientific philosophy. The same 
holds good of Darwin's doctrine of the " Origin of Spe- 
cies." He proves on that point scientifically that the 
world develops in itself and not from the heavens above 
— " transcendentally " as the philosophers say. Darwin 
is a philosopher, though he makes no claim to that. To 
have worked for the monistic conception, both by his 
special demonstrations and general conclusion, he has in 
common with Kant and Hegel. 

Hegel teaches the theory of evolution; he teaches that 
the world was not made, is not a creation, has not an 
invariable and fixed existence, but is always in the mak- 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 321 

ing by its inherent force. Just as with Darwin the classes 
of animals are not divided by unbridgeable gulfs from 
each other, but on the contrary, are linked with each 
other, so with Hegel all categories and forms of the 
world, nothing and something, being and becoming, quan- 
tity and quality, consciousness and unconsciousness, 
progress and inertia — all inavoidably flow into each 
other. He teaches that there are differences everywhere, 
but nowhere — " exaggerated," metaphysical, transcend- 
ental differences. According to Hegel there are no 
such things which differ from each other "essentially." 
The difference between essential and non-essential is 
only to be understood as relative and gradual. There 
is only one absolute thing, and that is Cosmos, and 
everything which hangs about it are fluid, transient, 
changeable forms, accidentals or properties of the general 
being which in Hegel's terminology bears the name of 
the Absolute. 

Nobody will think of assorting that the philosopher 
has accomplished his work in the most lucid and com- 
plete manner. His teaching made further development 
as little superfluous as that of Darwin, but it gave an 
impetus to the entire science and the entire human life, — 
an impetus of the highest importance. Hegel has antici- 
pated Darwin, but Darwin unfortunately did not know 
Hegel. This " unfortunately " is not a reproach to the 
great naturalist, but merely a suggestion to us that we 
should supplement the work of the specialist Darwin by 
the work of the great generalizer Hegel and proceed still 
further to greater clearness. 

We have stated that Hegel's philosophy was so obscure 
that the master could say of his best disciple that he 
misunderstood him. It was with the view to illuminating 
this obscurity that not only the succeeding philosopher 



322 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Feuerbach and other Hegelians have worked, but also 
the entire, scientific, political and economic development 
of the world. When we consider Darwin's discoveries, 
and the latest theory of the transformation of energy, 
it must at last become clear to us — what occupied the 
best minds during three thousand years of civilized life — 
that the world is not made up of fixed classes, but is a 
fluid unity, the Absolute incarnate, which develops eter- 
nally and is only classified by the human mind for pur- 
poses of forming intelligent conceptions. 



Ernst Haeckel, the well-known naturalist and discipU 
of Darwin, says in his preface to a paper read by him 
at Eisenach on September 1 8, 1882, and published after- 
wards at Jena, " that the present attitude of Virchow 
towards Darwinism is entirely different from that which 
he assumed at Munich five years previously. In rising 
at the above mentioned Congress of Anthropologists im- 
mediately after Dr. Lucse he (Virchow) not only turned 
against this latter's assertions and paid Darwin the mer- 
ited amount of his high admiration, but he expressly 
acknowledged that his more important propositions are 
logical postulates, irresistible demands of our reason, 
' Yes/ said Virchow, ' I do not for a moment deny that 
the generatio aquivoca is a sort of general demand of the 
human mind. . . . Also the idea that man has 
evolved through a slow and gradual development from 
the ranks of lower animals, is a logical postulate.' ,! 

The enlightened knowledge of Nature, proceeds then 
Haeckel in his speech, " recognizes only that natural rev- 
elation which is open to everyone in the book of Nature 
and can be learned by every one who is free from pre- 
conceived notions and is endowed with healthy sense* 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY. 323 

and a healthy mind. From the study of that book we 
gain that monistic and purest form of belief which 
amounts to a conviction in the unity of Gad and Nature 
and which found long since its complete expression in 
the pantheistic professions of our greatest poets and 
thinkers." 

That our greatest poets and thinkers exhibit the ten- 
dency to a monistic and pure form of belief and strive 
after a physical view of Nature which makes all meta- 
physics impossible and excludes from the scientific world 
the supernatural God together with the miracle-rub- 
bish, — that is quite true. But when Haeckel gets carried 
away by his feelings so as to declare that the tendency 
"has long since found its most complete expression," then 
he is laboring under a very grave delusion, — a delusion 
as regards even himself and his own profession of faith. 
Haeckel, too, does not know yet how to think monistically. 

We shall presently justify our reproach; but it may 
be stated at once that it affects not only Haeckel, but the 
entire school of our modern natural science, because it 
has neglected the results of two and a half thousand 
years of philosophic research, which has back of it a 
long empirical history not less so than experimental 
science itself. 

The above mentioned lecture by Haeckel contains the 
following passage: "We should like to emphasize es- 
pecially the conciliating and soothing effect of our genetic 
view of Nature,— this the more so as our opponents are 
continually engaged in trying to ascribe to it destructive 
and dissolving tendencies. The latter are supposed to 
work not only against science, but against religion also 
and in so far against the most important foundation of 
our civilized life in general. Such serious charges, in 
*o far as they really are based on conviction and not 



324 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

merely on sophistical syllogisms can only be explained 
by a lamentable lack of knowledge of what constitutes 
the real essence of true religion. This essence is not 
based on a special form of faith, of domination, but 
rather on the critically sound conviction of the ultimate 
unknowable and common cause of all things. In this 
acknowledgment that the ultimate cause of all phenomena 
is with the present organization of our brain unknowable, 
critical natural philosophy meets with dogmatic re- 
ligion." 

There are three points in this confession of Haeckel 
which should be kept separately and prove to us that the 
"monistic view of the world " has even in its most radi- 
cal and scientific representative not found as yet its com- 
plete expression. 

1. Haeckel wants to clear natural science from the re- 
proach of having " destructive tendencies.'' This en- 
lightened science, which knows only of a natural revela- 
tion and has its religion or form of faith in the unity of 
God and Nature should — 

2. Not act destructively upon the prevailing religion 
which is based on a supernatural or unnatural revelation. 
This unnatural religion, forsooth, possesses a true essence 
which is also recognized by the natural or scientific re- 
ligion. This is the common cause of all things. 

Very well, the old belief has the common cause of all 
that is in a personal God who is sitpernaturally, in- 
describably, inconceivably a spirit or a mystery. The 
new religion a la Haeckel believes to possess in Nature — 
also named God — a common cause of all things, and so 
the two forms of faith possess a common cause. The 
difference only is that the cause, recognised by natural 
science, is the every-day Nature which, of course, is 
mysterious enough, yet its mysteries, its riddles are only 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 325 

such as natural science is engaged in solving. The sort 
of Nature which Haeckel transforms into a God, which 
he deifies, is also a mystery, but only a natural, an every- 
day mystery, whilst the supernaturally revealed God is, 
according to all that is said of him, of a nature thor- 
oughly inexpressible, undefinable by any words at our 
command. Or, since one cannot help treating the good 
religious God with human words, it is easy to under- 
stand how in such process all these names and words 
lose their human sense. Just put the religious God and 
the natural God of Haeckel side by side: both of them 
are omnipotent ; Nature makes everything which is made, 
but only in a natural, every-day sense. The good God 
in Heavens, too, makes everything, but not naturally; 
he makes it unnaturally in a sense and in a way which 
does not even admit of being defined, of being expressed. 
The good God, forsooth, is a spirit, but not such as 
dwells in old castles, nor such a limited one as man has 
in his head, but a spirit like no spirit, a monster-spirit, 
a monster-mind whose constitution cannot even be ex- 
pressed in words. 

Before we pass to the third point of the " purest form 
of faith," we must consider a little closer the two already 
mentioned. It will then be the more easy to dispose of 
the third and last one as well as of the final combination 
of all the three in one. 

The difference between the every-day natural and 
the unnatural, between the physical and metaphysical 
revelation, religion or divinity, is so great that the en- 
lightened view of Nature, as represented by Haeckel the 
Darwinian, would have been justified to forego the old 
names and the revealed divine religion and put " de- 
structively " against it the monistic view of the world. 
By not doing that, Darwinism only manifests the limi- 



326 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

tation of its theory of evolution. In so far as it wants 
to remain monistic it ought to have viewed Nature only 
physically, not metaphysically. It must see in Nature 
the primary cause of all things, but not a mysterious one, 
that is, a not yet explored, but never an inexplorable 
cause, — • inexplorab!e in the metaphysical sense. 

That Haeckel, however, the most radical representative 
of natural science monism, still rides that dualistic horse, 
is proclaimed openly by the third point which finds the 
ultimate cause of all phenomena " with the present or- 
ganization of our brain " unknowable. 

What is knowablef 

The whole context to which that word belongs shows 
conclusively that our monistic scientist is still in the mire 
of metaphysics. Nothing in the world, not an atom of 
it, is to be known out and out. Everything in the world 
is inexhaustible in its secrets, no less than it is imper- 
ishable and indestructible in its essence. With all that, 
we learn every day more and more to know the things, 
and learn that there is nothing which is closed to our 
mind. Just as the human mind is unlimited in the dis- 
covery of mysteries and problems, so, on the other hand, 
the inexhaustible and the unknowable yield themselves 
readily and unreservedly to its inquiries and its attempts 
to solve them. 

It is due to the " old belief " that the words, the speech, 
have acquired a double meaning, — a natural, relative and 
common-sense one, and a transcendental, metaphysical 
one. The reader may notice the double effect of natural 
science when it is compromised by metaphysics; it con- 
tains mysteries and propagates, by their solution, the 
conviction that what was formerly a mystery becomes 
through research an ordinary, everyday thing in the chain 
of interrelation. Nature is full of mysteries which re- 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 327 

veal themselves to the inquiring mind as ordinary prop- 
erties. Nature is inexhaustible in scientific problems. 
We sound them and we can never come to an end with 
this sounding. The human common-sense is quite right 
when it finds the world or Nature unfathomable, but it 
is also right when it repudiates all metaphysical unfath- 
omableness of the world as transcendental folly and su- 
perstition. We shall never finish with our exploration 
of Nature, ^nd yet the more natural science proceeds in 
its exploration the more strikingly patent it becomes 
that it need not at all fear the inexhaustible mysteries, 
that " there is nothing which resists it " (Hegel). Hence 
it follows that the inexhaustible " primary cause of all 
things " is being pumped daily with our instrument of 
knowledge which is no less universal or infinite in its 
capacity for exploration than Nature in setting problems. 

" With the present organisation of our brain!" No 
doubt. Our brain will yet, through sexual selection and 
struggle for existence, develop enormously and probe 
more and more the natural cause of things. If that 
phrase is meant in this sense, then we perfectly agree. 
But it is not meant so by the metaphysically prejudiced 
Darwinian. The human mind is supposed to be too small 
for the thorough exploration of the world, in order that 
we may believe in a monster-mind and not combat him 
" destructively." 

Darwin with all his merits was an exceedingly modest 
man; he was content with a special branch of inquiry. 
Everybody should be as modest, but not everybody should 
limft himself to the same specialty. Science has not only 
to investigate the morphology of plants and animals; it 
has to deal also with the problem, as to how the unknow- 
able changes into the knowable, and must not exclude 
from it? province the ultimate cause of all existence. 



328 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Hegel has propounded the doctrine of evolution on a 
far more universal scale than Darwin. We do not wish 
on that account to prefer or to subordinate the one to 
the other, but merely to supplement the one by the other. 
If Darwin teaches us that amphibia and birds are not 
eternally separated classes, but emerge from one another 
and merge into one another, then Hegel teaches us that 
all classes, that the whole world, is a living being which 
has nowhere rigid limits so that even the knowable and 
unknowable, the physical and metaphysical, flow into one 
another, and the absolutely Inconceivable is a thing which 
belongs not to the monistic, but to the dualistic, religious 
view of the world. 

" We have to go back twenty-five centuries, to the 
dawn of classical antiquity in order to find the first germs 
of a natural philosophy, that pursued with a clear pur- 
pose Darwin's object, viz., to find the natural causes of 
the phenomena of Nature and thus to dissipate the beliei 
in supernatural causes, in miracles. It was the founders 
of Greek philosophy in the seventh and sixth centuries 
B.C. who laid this true cornerstone of knowledge and 
tried to discover a natural common cause of all things " 
(Haeckel, 1. c). 

Now, if our esteemed naturalist drops this " natural " 
cause and substitutes a mysterious cause which is so won- 
derful that we cannot possibly know anything of it, he 
again leaves us a metaphysical ultimate cause to believe 
in, which brings us in line with religion. — Does he not 
thereby play false to the common aim of Darwin and his 
critical natural philosophy? 

According to our monism Nature is the ultimate cause 
of all things; it is also the cause of our faculty of cog- 
nition ; yet this faculty, according to Haeckel, is too small 
to know the ultimate cause! How does that fit in? 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 329 

Nature is recognised as the ultimate cause, and yet it is 
to remain unknowable ! 

The fear of destructive tendencies has taken hold of 
even such a determined evolutionist as Haeckel. He aban- 
dons his own theory and lands in the belief that the hu- 
man mind must content itself with the phenomenon of 
Nature and is unable to reach the true essence of it. The 
ultimate cause is, according to our naturalist, an object 
which does not come within the province of natural 
science. 

" The contentedness in receiving and the parsimony in 
giving are not virtues in the domain of science," says 
Hegel in the preface to his " Phenomenology of the 
Mind." He goes on saying: Those who merely seek 
edification, who desire to envelop in a mist the earthly 
manifold richness of existence and of thought, and 
hanker after the vague enjoyment of this indefinite di- 
vinity, may look out where to find it ; they will easily 
discover the means to rave about it and to put on mys- 
terious airs. But philosophy must take care not to wish 
to become edifying. 

Darwin's aim has been represented by his most ac- 
knowledged disciple as a philosophic one, — to find out 
the natural causes and to dispel the belief in supernatural 
intervention and miracles. And yet the wonderful in- 
conceivableness of the common cause of all things, the 
wonderful limitation of the human mind must still re- 
main untouched for the sake of edifying conciliation ! 

Our reproach against Haeckel, the Darwinian, amounts 
to this : he has not assimilated the results of two and a 
half thousand years of philosophic evolution and there- 
fore, though he may, perhaps, know very well the nature 
of " the present organisation of our brain," he neverthe- 
less sadlv tacks the knowledge of the process of cognition 



330 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

which is a thing different from the physiology of th< 
brain. At least, so much do the above quoted passages 
show that Haeckel's ideas of the natural and unnatural, 
of the wonderful and knowable, as well as his ideas of 
the natural divinity and the divine nature are not monis- 
tic, but are still permeated by a very reactionary dualism. 

As to the pantheistic professions of our greatest poets 
and thinkers, — professions which culminate in the con- 
viction of the unity of God and Nature, Hegel has left 
us a very characteristic doctrine. According to it, we 
not only know the unity of things, but also their differ- 
ence. A poodle and a bloodhound are both dogs, but 
this unity does not prevent differences. Nature has much 
likeness to God, — it rules from eternity to eternity. As 
our mind is its instrument, a natural instrument, Nature 
knows everything that there is to be known. It is omnis- 
cient. Yet natural wisdom is sufficiently different from 
divine wisdom that there are enough scientific reasons for 
the destructive tendencies to do away entirely with God, 
religion and metaphysics, — to do away in a rational man- 
ner so far as they can be done away with. The con- 
fused ideas have been before and will therefore remain 
as have-beens in all eternity. 

The Hegelian, too, assumes towards religion an atti- 
tude which is merely scientific, not irreconcilable. We 
readily recognize religion as a natural phenomenon which 
in its time and under special circumstances was fully 
justified, and, like all phenomena, like wood and stone, 
carries within its transient shell an eternal germ of truth. 
What Hegel has failed to do, or done imperfectly, was 
supplemented by his follower Feuerbach. He brought 
that germ to light and showed that burned wood does 
not come to nothing, but turns into ashes and undergoes 
in that process such a change that the use of the former 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 33I 

name is no longer permissible. The transformation of 
wood into ashes is a development; likewise religion de- 
velops into science. And when the Darwinian, in spite 
of that manifests a desire to leave in the ultimate cause 
of all things something undeveloped and undevelopable, 
something mysterious and metaphysical he only shows 
that he has not grasped the doctrine of evolution in its 
universality and that the great Hegel who developed the 
doctrine of cognition is for him a " dead dog." 



Let us cast a cursory glance over Darwin's work. His 
subject matter is the animal in general, the cmimality, the 
animal life in its generic sense. Before Darwin we only 
knew living individuals, and the general animal was a 
mere abstraction. Since then, however, we have learned 
that not only individuals, but also the general animal, is 
a living being. The animality exists, moves and changes, 
undergoes a historic development, is a widely ramified 
organism. Before Darwin the ramifications or divisions 
of the animal world were marked off by zoologists ac- 
cording to a fixed system. They divided it into classes, — 
fishes, amphibia, insects, birds, and so forth. Darwin 
has introduced life into this system. He showed us that 
animality is not a dead abstract entity, but is a moving 
process of which our knowledge has up till now given 
us but a scanty picture. And if the old knowledge of 
the animal world was a scanty picture and the new one is 
more substantial, more complete and truthful, then the 
gain from it by our knowledge is not confined to the 
animal world. We also gain at the same time an insight 
into our faculty of cognition, viz., that the latter is not a 
supernatural source of truth, but a mirror-like instru- 
ment which reflects the things of the world, or Nature. 



332 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

Darwin was the negation of a metaphysician. With- 
out, perhaps, knowing it or wishing it, he took meta- 
physics, the belief in the miraculous, by the throat; he 
removed in zoology the unnatural class-lines and gave the 
edifying belief in the metaphysical, wonderful nature of 
the human organ of cognition a blow which stuck, and 
substantially illuminated philosophy, the critique of reason 
or theory of cognition. 

If not Darwin himself, at least, his follower Haeckel 
told us that his master was a glorious fighter against 
metaphysics. This is the ground on which he meets 
Hegel and all philosophers as allies. All of them strove 
after illumination, — especially the illumination of the 
metaphysical dimness, though they themselves were la- 
boring more or less under it. 

Hegel has much in common with the old Heraclitus, 
nicknamed " the Obscure." Both of them taught, that 
the things of the world do not stand still, but flow, that is, 
develop, and both of them deserve being nicknamed " the 
Obscure." To illuminate a little Hegel's obscurity it is 
necessary to pass in brief review the development of phi- 
losophy. 

Science began its career more as philosophy than nat- 
ural science, that is, it lived at the beginning more in 
metaphysical speculation than in real Nature. True, 
mankind had already made some excursions into natural 
science before, just as our most modern naturalists some- 
times land in a backward philosophy ; still we must say 
in all truth that the old cultivators of science were phi- 
losophers while the modern were naturalists. Now at 
last the conciliation is near at hand, or even already con- 
cluded. Now the question is of a completely systematic, 
natural view of the world which has neither before nor 
behind it anything supernatural, " edifying " or meta- 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OE EPISTEMOLOGY 333 

physical. Since the days of the Greek colonies, since 
Thales, Democritus and Heraclitus, Pythagoras, Socrates 
and Plato, philosophy sought to solve the riddle of Na- 
ture. But they were continually in doubt and in the 
darkness as to the ways and means of inquiry, whether 
the solution of the problem was to be sought in the outer 
or inner world, in matter or in mind. And in modern 
times, too, when after a thousand years of darkness a 
new scientific day dawned, and the philosophers took up 
again the work of the old predecessors, — at the time of 
Bacon, Descartes and Leibnitz — the dispute about the 
" method " and the proper " organon " for the acquire- 
ment of truth was still going on. The whole thing ap- 
peared doubtful, — especially the nature of truth wlrch 
was to be investigated and the riddle which was to be 
solved, whether it be natural or supernatural, — indeed, 
so doubtful that, as is well known, Descartes made 
Doubt the primary condition and the cardinpl Virtue of 
inquiry. 

Yet science could not stop at that point. It had to ar- 
rive at Certainty, — particularly on that question which 
for Descartes and for all other philosophers was the most 
pressing. It needed certainty about the method, that is, 
how one must proceed in the inquiry '.n order to arrive at 
scientific truth which is identical ^ith certainty. At the 
same time natural science already began to apply practi- 
cally the method which the philosophers were still search- 
ing for. And the great Descartes was, too, partly a 
scientist, and proceeded in philosophy so far as to make 
the above mentioned method the definite, clearly-con- 
ceived subject of his main work. 

And now the light spreads more and more. The meta- 
physical, the inconceivable, the mysterious has to go, and 
must be driven out of science, and its place taken up by 



334 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

certainty, by the undoubted. The process is in full swing. 
The philosophers develop mightily and the scientists 
render them mighty assistance. 

And here comes the great Kant with his question: 
"How is metaphysics possible as a science?" 

Let us keep in mind what the old Konigsberg phi- 
losopher means by " metaphysics." He means by it the 
miraculous, the mysterious, the inconceivable, that is the 
traditional, theological subject-matters: " God, Freedom, 
Immortality." 

You have been talking about it a pretty long time, says 
Kant. I will now try and see whether it is really pos- 
sible to know anything about the matter. And he takes 
as his model Copernicus. After astronomy had for a 
long time allowed the sun to move round the earth and 
not much came out of it, Copernicus turned the method 
upside down and attempted to see whether it would not 
be better when the sun was fixed and the earth moved 
round. With the assistance of the faculty of cognition 
Man has, up to the time of Kant, tried to probe the great 
metaphysical, the existence of the world-miracle. The 
famous author of the " Critique of Pure Reason " turns 
the thing round and takes the piece of Nature which man 
feels glowing in his head, — the lamp of illumination of 
which some empirical information had been gained be- 
fore — and attempts to find out, whether with this lamp 
it is possible to illuminate the great sea-serpent which 
since the Christian era has been known under the name 
of God, Freedom and Immortality, but in classical an- 
tiquity was designated by its wise men as the True, the 
Good and the Beautiful. 

This classical name is very apt to mislead us. True, 
good and beautiful specialties, as they are daily cultivated 
by the exact sciences, must clearly be distinguished from 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPJSTEMOLOGY 335 

the great sea-serpent which floated before the eyes of the 
ancients when they investigated the abstract ideas. The 
Christian name with which Kant designates the meta- 
physical monster is in the present stage of the problem 
better calculated to bring out the difference between 
physics and metaphysics, between the perceptible Nature 
and the senseless Beyond. 

On the other hand, we are also apt to miss the true im- 
portance of the sea-serpent, if we concentrate our atten- 
tion exclusively on its religious color. Its belly is yellow 
and glitters with God, Freedom and Immortality ; but its 
back takes the color of its environment and by this 
mimicry it is able, like the white hare in the snow, to 
escape our eye. When, however, we come nearer and 
inspect the thing closely, w* find on its grey back the 
words " The True, the Good, the Beautiful " imprinted in 
Greek letters of a dark hue. If we resume in one word 
the inscriptions which the philosophical-theological- 
metaphysical sea-serpent bears on its back, the beast will, 
perhaps, be most aptly characterized by the beautiful 
name, " Truth." The double meaning of this word ought 
not to be missed. The sea-serpent-truth is transcen- 
dental. Still ft rests on a natural basis, on the basis of 
natural truth, which, of course, must be distinguished 
from the transcendental one. The natural truth is the 
scientific truth; it is not to be gazed at either with en- 
thusiasm or with " edification/' but it must be contem- 
plated soberly, and it is so general that all things, even 
the paving stones, belong to it. The sea-serpent-truth 
is a human delusion of the childish prehistoric times ; the 
sober truth is a collective name which embraces in one 
conception both true fancies and true paving stones. 

Kant asked : How is metaphysics, that is, the belief in 
*h* supernatural, possible as a science? And he replied. 



336 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

This belief is not scientific. After having examined the 
intellect in its various faculties Kant comes to the con- 
clusion that the human mind can only form images of 
the phenomena of Nature and as far as science goes, does 
not know and does not wish to know of any other " true " 
spirit. Though the time for such a radical pronounce- 
ment was not ripe yet, nevertheless it is well known that 
Kant concludes his inquiry with the statement that 
Reason — meaning thereby the highest measure of our 
intellectual efforts — can only understand the mere 
appearances of things. 

The inquiry into the nature of the sea-serpent has in 
the hands of the philosopher Kant changed into the 
scientific and sober question, what sort of a light is it and 
what is it to illuminate. Still Kant, too, was unable to 
extricate himself from the muddle, whether he should 
combat the metaphysical monster, or criticize Reason, 
or do the two things at the same time. His successors, 
Fichte, Schelling and Hegel, had to take up the same 
work and continue it. By the inquiry into the human 
mind the head of the sea-serpent is to be crushed, — that 
is certain, so much had the road been cleared by the 
Konigsberg Copernicus. Still we must not allow our- 
selves to be carried away by the enthusiasm for his 
heroic deed to such an extent as to ignore the fact that 
neither he nor his followers have completely purged 
their emotions from the wretched metaphysics, from the 
belief in a higher truth than the natural one. They 
rather guess at the monstrous than perceive it, and they 
only gain their victory step by step. 

Kant argues as follows: Even if our Reason be 
limited to the knowledge of natural appearances, even 
if we could not know anything beyond that, we still 
must believe in something mysterious, higher, meta- 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 337 

physical. There must be something behind the appear- 
ances, " since where there are appearances there must 
be something which appears." So concludes Kant, — 
only seemingly a correct conclusion. Is it not enough 
that natural appearances appear? Why should there be 
anything else behind them, — something transcendental, 
inconceivable — but their own nature? However, let 
that pass. Kant expelled — at least formally — meta- 
physics from scientific pursuits and relegated it to the 
province of belief. 

That was in the eyes of the successors and especially 
of Hegel too little. The belief which Kant had left, of 
the limited mind, the limits which he had set to scientific 
inquiry, were to this giant of thought too narrow; he 
soared into the Universe and there " there should be noth- 
ing to resist him." He wants to escape from the meta- 
physical prison into the fresh physical air; and this is 
not to be understood in the sense as if Hegel himself 
were mentally free and wanted to assist others to gain 
such freedom. No, the philosopher himself is prejudiced 
and wants to be instructed. His mind, his flame is but a 
portion of the universal light which glows in every man, 
which wants to, and can illuminate everything, but can 
only proceed step by step. 

In consequence of the more or less entangled nature 
of things our discussion, too, cannot be free from en- 
tanglement. We wish to elucidate the connection between 
the old philosophers and their " last knight," then between 
Hegel, Darwin and the whole science. Hence our epi- 
sodical excursions in various directions. 

In order to elucidate the teaching of Hegel in relation 
to that of Darwin it is necessary above all to keep in 
mind the bewildering double nature of all science. 
Every scientist — and Darwin, too — illuminates not only 



338 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

his special subject-matter on which he is consciously 
engaged; but his special contributions at the same time 
inevitably assist in illuminating the relation of human 
mind to the world as a whole. This relation originally 
was a slavish, religious, non-human one. The human 
mind considered itself and the world as a riddle which it 
was unable to illuminate with the light of his knowledge, 
but which could only form fantastical imaginings of the 
overpowering metaphysical thing. Every contribution 
which has been made to science since the beginning of 
human history has weakened the slave chain in which our 
race was born. Both the philosophers and the scientists 
were fettered by it, and the emancipating work was done 
conjointly and has proceeded vigorously to this very 
day. The scientists, however, have no reason to look 
down upon their colleagues, the philosophers. They, the 
scientists, with Darwin at their head, look straight in 
the face of their selected special subject-matter, and 
squint at the same time at the general riddle, the riddle of 
the Universe. Even when Darwin declares explicitly that 
science has nothing to do with the sea-serpent and thus 
clears it out of his way or relegates it a la Kant to the 
province of belief, these are merely subjective limitations 
or anxieties which may be pardonable as far as the in- 
dividual is concerned, but must not fetter the universal 
research of the human race. Now, there cannot be 
knowledge here and belief there; it is the solution of all 
doubt that is required, and whosoever's doctrine is op- 
posed to such a demand will be rejected by posterity as a 
piece of cowardice. 

It was said before that the scientists boldly contem- 
plate their specialties while they squint at the monstrous 
miracle-world. We may now add that the philosophers 
let the rays of their intellectual light fall direct upon the 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 339 

great sea-serpent and get thereby so dizzy that they 
squint back at their own light as something meta- 
physical. The confusion which arises from the be- 
wildering double nature of knowledge is now overcome 
by the discovery that the human mind, or the light which 
illuminates the things, is of the same nature, of the same 
kind as the objects which are illuminated and that is the 
result of ages of philosophic thinking. 

Kant left to posterity the excessively humble opinion 
that the light of cognition of his race is far too small to 
illuminate the great, wonderful beast. By showing that 
't is not too small, that our light is neither smaller nor 
larger, neither more wonderful nor less, than the object 
which has to be illuminated, the belief in miracles, in the 
sea-serpent, i. e., metaphysics, is at once done away with. 
Simultaneously man loses his excessive humbleness; and 
it was our Hegel who substantially contributed to that 
result 

A thorough perception of the situation requires the 
historical reconstruction of philosophic development, piece 
by piece in all the details. Still, we may in this respect, 
too, content ourselves with a brief sketch, since general 
education is now so widely spread, that the interested 
reader can easily supply himself the fitting illustrations 
to the picture presented here. 

The labors of Darwin and Hegel, however differing 
in other respects, have this much in common that both of 
them combat the metaphysical, the non-perceptible and 
the nonsensical. While proposing to explain both the 
difference and community of the two thinkers we can- 
not help drawing within the province of our investiga- 
tion the great sea-serpent. The sport, however, is ren- 
dered difficult by the numerous names which in the course 
of History have become attached to the monster. What 



340 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

is metaphysics ? According to the name it is a branch of 
study, — or rather, it was, and now it casts its shadow on 
the present. What is it after? What does it want? Of 
course, enlightenment! But on what subject? On the 
subject of God, Freedom and Immortality. This sounds 
nowadays quite parson-like. And even if we should 
characterize its subject-matter by the classical names 
of the True, the Good and the Beautiful, there is still 
enough occasion left to. make it clear, both to ourselves 
and to the reader, what it is for which the metaphysi- 
cians are looking? Without this it is impossible to 
measure and to explain what Darwin or Hegel accom- 
plished or left undone and what, in consequence, there is 
still left for posterity to accomplish. 

The sea-serpent cannot be at all characterized by an apt 
name since it has so many. Its origin goes back to the 
childhood of the human race, and the comparative phi- 
lology is agreed upon the point that in those prehistoric 
times the things had many names and the names denoted 
many things, and this resulted in a great confusion 
which in modern times has been investigated and recog- 
nised as the source of mythology. 

One has only to see what, for instance, Max Miiller 
has to say on that point in his " Chips from a German 
Workshop." We are told there that the heathen and 
Christian fables about God, etc., were no empty non- 
sense, but natural developments of the store of speech. 
It was the poetical predilections of the ancient peoples 
that found vent in the language. Sober as we have be- 
come by now we still use such expressions as that of 
" killing time." Such pictures, full of sense and in- 
telligence, served the ancients, inclined as they were to 
poetry and transcendentalism, for the filling out of the 
metaphysical wonder-world. Names are and have al' 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 34I 

ways been images of things. Those who forget this 
simple fact and ascribe to words a transcendental sense, 
are engaged in metaphysics. The latter is the general 
idea underlying all fables. The poet is a conscious fable- 
spinner, fables are unconscious poetry. Hence it follows 
that when we speak of the wonder-world it all depends 
on the consciousness with which we accompany our 
words. Everything which exists is heavenly, divine, in- 
describable, inconceivable if we only mean to give there- 
by vent to our overpowering emotions caused by the 
natural wonderfulness of Nature. But nobody may in a 
sober manner express himself to the effect that every- 
thing which exists is a sea-serpent and is bound up 
with the unnatural truth or with something which the 
metaphysical enthusiast calls God, Freedom and Im- 
mortality. 

It was not to overcome poetry, but to overcome the un- 
conscious, exaggerated poetry that constituted the object 
of the movement for human enlightenment in which all 
workers of science have participated, partly deliberately, 
partly against their will. 



V. 

THE LIGHT OF COGNITION. 

Where is light to be got from ? Moses brought it down 
from Mount Sinai ; but after his people had been praying 
for more than three thousand years : Thou shalt not 
steal, they steal like ravens to this very day. That means 
that the Revelation proved futile. Then came the 
philosophers and wanted to extract light from the inner- 
most of their heads, a 'priori knowledge as they call it. 
But what had been established by one to-day was upset 
by the other the next day. Natural science chose a 
third path, the inductive path, and drew its wisdom 
from observation. This discipline has finally obtained 
true, real, durable knowledge which is accepted by every- 
body and is not disputed — and cannot be disputed by 
anybody. Hence it clearly and unmistakably follows that 
we must seek enlightment along the road entered upon 
by natural science. 

Still there are a good number of people — even among 
the " higher " circles and equipped with the best of 
knowledge, who declare themselves not satisfied with this 
light. They speak of the metaphysical craving, they build 
up a literature of their own and try incessantly to prove 
that all interpretation and knowledge of natural science, 
however fertile in individual branches, is, on the whole, 
inadequate. " The nature of matter," they say, " is in 
the last resort inconceivable ; all mechanical interpretation 
of Nature refers only to changes of the enigmatic sub- 

342 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 343 

stance and leaves our craving for causation in the last 
instance unsatisfied." 

Julius Frauenstadt says : " The need for metaphysics 
has been compared by Schopenhauer to the need of a 
man for further information when finding himself in a 
totally unknown company whose members are introduc- 
ing themselves to him one after another as friends and 
uncles. Where the deuce do I come to such a company 
of friends? This is the specifically philosophical ques- 
tion. Where natural science ends, there philosophy be- 
gins." . . . " Though the subject of both is the 
same," says Frauenstadt further, " the whole world, the 
Cosmos, — nevertheless natural science studies its subject 
from the point of view of its law-determined manifesta- 
tion, whilst philosophy studies it in its inner essence." 
Only, thus, we must at once add, such philosophical con- 
templation has not borne any fruit and has not dis- 
covered anything of the inner essence of Nature. 

Nature, as is known, gives us only phenomena, trans- 
formations. Everything flows, everything is in the 
making, in emerging and submerging. The philosophers, 
however, want something substantial, essential, what 
Dtihring calls " unchangeable truths." As nothing of 
this kind can be found, the majority have desisted from 
further searching and turned, after the example of Kant, 
from philosophy to " critical philosophy," that is, they 
shift the blame for not finding the substantial, un- 
changeable spectre, on to the wretchedness of our faculty 
of cognition which, being incapable of anything higher, 
creeps about the treasures which rust and moths destroy. 

And thus, as thousands of years ago, we hang be- 
tween heaven and earth. Many have succeeded in ex- 
tricating themselves from that position; but only in 
practice. Since religion and metaphysics could not yield 



344 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

anything positive, the materialists of the old school con- 
tent themselves with jumping over the supernatural 
snares and tricks and passing over to the scientific order 
of the day. Stiebeling says : " A bridge can only be 
built from that bank where natural science has pitched 
its camp. It will be a pontoon-bridge. All new facts, 
observations and discoveries will be joined one with the 
other in a regular order till they reach the other bank 
lying in the misty distance. It is only then and not be- 
fore that the true system will be arrived at." 

But now other competent scientists come and show 
that this method not only postpones the solution of the 
problem to a far too distant future, but has really no 
prospect of success whatsoever: all pontoons which 
natural science successively joins bring us no nearer to 
the opposite bank. " And even," says Schopenhauer, " if 
one were to visit all the planets of all the fixed stars, one 
would not proceed a single step in metaphysics." And 
not only the older generation of philosophers speaks thus, 
but more or less modern scientists. Dubois-Reymond 
speaks about the "limits of cognition of Nature," and 
shows that there are natural things which we cannot 
reach with our cognition, conception, interpretation, etc. 
In the 271 volume of the " Collection of Popular Lec- 
tures " by Virchow and Holzendorf, a Dr. Topfer de- 
clares : " We, of course, know that with the assumption 
of atoms the nature of matter is not defined. But the 
scientist does not consider it his business to define the 
nature of matter. He adheres to facts and humbly ac- 
knowledges that the human mind has limits set to it 
which it can never overstep." 

One could quote any number of passages from con- 
temporary literature stating what an absolute gulf there 
is between ordinary cognition of Nature and the meta- 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 345 

physical craving. This means that the confusion on the 
question: Where is Light to be got from? is endless. 
But a truly classical piece of confusion is given to us by 
F. A. Lange in his " History of Materialism." Apart 
from the numerous secondary beauties and excellent qual- 
ities of the work, apart also from the democratic kinship 
of the' author with Social-Democracy, — things which we 
gladly acknowledge — the philosophic standpoint of 
Lange is the most pitiful exhibition of convulsive 
struggling in the metaphysical noose that has ever been 
seen. Indeed, it is precisely that continual swinging to 
and fro which lends the work its chief importance, since 
though no problem is solved and nothing is decided, it 
places the problem in such a clear light as to bring the 
final solution unavoidably near. 

And now come opponents like Dr. Gideon Spieker 
(" On the relation between natural science and phi- 
losophy ") and point to those convulsions and abuse their 
justified criticism in order to discredit with Lange at the 
same time the conception of materialism. Thus, not only 
the eternal, the metaphysical craving, but the real need 
of the present day demands that we should advance be- 
yond the practical materialists. These people simply dis- 
miss the question of the nature, the substance and the 
limits of cognition, and go on with their building of scien- 
tific pontoons, not seeing or not wishing to see, that one 
may, of course, be carried away by the stream, but that 
it is impossible to arrive at the opposite bank, where the 
metaphysical infatuation dwells. 

Materialism, which has learned to practice the 
knowledge and interpretation of the most varied scientific 
matters, has failed up till now to explain the matter of 
cognition, and therefore, even its sympathetic historian 
was unable to gain from it a decisive preponderance over 



346 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

the idealistic ruins. The faculty of cognition or inter- 
pretation is the only force which is still being deified. It 
is of the world, and yet must not be worldly, physical, me- 
chanical. What, then, is it? Metaphysical! And none 
is able to explain what that means. All the definitions 
which we get are negative. The metaphysical is not 
physical, not palpable, not conceivable. What else can 
it be but an emotion which the happy idealists carry about 
with them without knowing where it is? 

Man wants to know everything, and yet there is some- 
thing which cannot be known, or explained, or con- 
ceived. Then one resigns himself to one's fate and 
points out the limitation of the human understanding. 
" There are two points," says Lange, " where the human 
mind fails. We are not able to understand the atoms and 
we cannot explain out of the atoms and their movement 
even the slightest manifestation of consciousness. . . , 
One may turn and twist the idea of matter and its forces 
as one likes, — one invariably reaches a residuum which is 
inconceivable. . . . Not without justification, there- 
fore, Dubois-Reymond ventured to assert that our entire 
knowledge of Nature is in reality not knowledge, but a 
substitute of an interpretation. . . . This is the point 
which the systematisers and apostles of a mechanical view 
of the world pass by heedlessly, — the question of the 
limits of the cognition of Nature." (A. Lange, " Ge- 
schichte des Materialismus, 2 vol. p. 148-150.) 

This, with its exact reference to chapter and verse was, 
properly speaking, superfluous, since the phrase is 
thoroughly well known. It is not only Lange who 
speaks thus, but also Jtirgen Bona Meyer and von Sybel. 
Also Schafrle and Samter would speak in a similar strain 
were they to render an opinion. In fact, the whole ruling 
world speaks thus, — so far as it has advanced beyond the 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 347 

Capucines. The Social-Democrats, however, were known 
to Lange insufficiently, — else he would have known that 
in regard to this point, too, the mechanical view of the 
world had been completed by them. 

The reader may well stop and consider where it would 
lead if our knowledge and cognition, if the mental in- 
strument which during the last few centuries has been 
applied with so much success by science should be a 
mere "surrogate." Where is, then, the honest John? 
And if we were to look through all the big folios of phi- 
losophy, we should still not find any positive answer to it, 
since it were precisely the philosophers who have so far 
destroyed the belief in a personal ruler of heaven and 
earth. The unphilosophical, the religious world really 
had somewhere in excelsis a true fund of Reason which 
had lent some slight breath to a piece of dirty clay. 
These people were, therefore, justified in distinguishing 
the holy mind from the profane, the genuine from its 
surrogate. But how can such distinctions be upheld by 
those who had left the great spirit-in-chief way up in 
the clouds to the ignorant back-woodsmen, passes my 
comprehension. 

" The great step backwards, made by Hegel, as com- 
pared with Kant," says Lange, " consists in that he en- 
tirely lost the idea of a more general way of knowing 
things than the human one/' Thus Lange deplores that 
Hegel did not speculate about any superhuman knowl- 
edge, and we reply to it by saying that the reactionary 
cry : " Back to Kant ! " which at present is heard every- 
where, arises from the monstrous tendency to put back 
the clock of science and to subordinate the human 
knowledge to a " more general way of knowing." One 
would like to abolish the dominion over Nature which 
mankind has so far won and to get for the old bogey- 



34§ PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

man the crown and sceptre out of the lumber-room to re- 
establish the reign of superstition. The philosophic cur- 
rent of our time is a conscious or unconscious reaction 
against the visibly growing freedom of the people. 

The metaphysical idea of the " limits of cognition," 
which runs through all the chapters of Lange's famous 
book and which is accepted wholesale by the learned men 
of the age, need only to be examined a little closer so 
far as its contents go in order to reveal itself immediately 
as a conglomerate of empty phrases. " The atoms cannot 
be understood, nor is consciousness to be explained." But 
the whole world consists of atoms and consciousness, of 
matter and mind. If the two are unintelligible, then 
what is there left for the human reason to understand and 
to explain ? Lange is right, — properly speaking, nothing. 
Our ideas are in reality not ideas, but substitutes. Per- 
haps, the grey beasts, commonly called asses, are mere 
asinine substitutes and the genuine asininity is to be 
looked for among the higher organized creatures. I have 
already characterized elsewhere philosophy as a science 
which seeks a cracked and crazy sort of truth. When 
one starts to mistrust the language and charge it with 
giving things perverted names, then it is a sure sign that 
something has begun to crack. Listen to the following 
passage from the " History of Materialism " : " Shall 
we define the idea of the true, the good, the real, etc., in 
a sense that we call that true, good or real which is so to 
mankind or shall we imagine that what man regards as 
such is also and to the same extent valid for all thinking 
beings that are and may be ? " 

We reply to this definitely and simply: As truly as 
that is true folly which language calls folly, so it is a 
perversion to imagine that the true, good, real or think- 
ing being can elsewhere be constituted differently from 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 349 

the one which our language terms as true, good, real or 
thinking being. And the metaphysical water, too, must 
be thoroughly wet, since what is not wet cannot be called 
water. We certainly do not know how many strange 
kinds of trees may yet be found in Central Africa, but so 
much we do know with the apodictical certainty of Kant 
that the boards which are cut out of trees, may the latter 
grow on the planet Mars or Jupiter, cannot look, cannot 
make themselves felt to the touch, cannot taste the same 
as beef. The reader will forgive the drastic comparison, 
— but whenever the metaphysical craving begins to con- 
fuse the language, patience comes to an end. 

Our experiences, observations or " phenomena " are 
classified by our faculty of cognition and by our lan- 
guage and designated by names. So long as the future 
changes are not essential, that is, so long as the move- 
ment of Nature keeps within the limits as fixed by con- 
ception and language, everything remains as before. But 
if and as soon as the future changes overstep those 
limits, so that the true, the good, the thinking beings, 
boards or beef or knowledge appear substantially dif- 
ferent, then they have become different things and we re- 
quire new names for their designation. 

The light of knowledge makes man the master of 
Nature. With its assistance he is able to produce in the 
summer the ice of winter and in the winter the fruits 
and flowers of summer. But withal the mastery over 
Nature remains limited. Everything that is possible to 
do is only possible with the assistance of natural forces 
and given material. To desire to rule over Nature in an 
unlimited way by means of a mere " let there be," can 
only be conceived by a dreamer. Just as children and 
savages wish to rule unlimitedly, so do our childish scien- 
tists wish to know unlimitedly. " The system of satisfy- 



350 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

ing oneself with the given world," says Lange, " is op- 
posed to the tendencies of unification inherent in Reason, 
it is also opposed to art, poetry and religion, which are 
possessed of the impulse to outrun the limits of experi- 
ence." Well, art and poetry are known as fancies, 
though beautiful and adorable ones; and if religion and 
the metaphysical impulse do not wish to be more than to 
subsist and to belong to the same category, no reasonable 
man will object. Man is quite entitled to his meta- 
physical impulse to outrun all limits if he only recognises 
that it is not a scientific impulse. The light of Reason 
has certainly its limits, the same as everything else, like 
wood and straw, like mechanics and understanding, — 
that is, rational limits which every part of the Universe 
must have if it does not want to be a piece of folly. 

As man can do everything, so can he know everything 
— within rational limits. We cannot create like God who 
made the world out of nothing. We must keep to the 
given, to the forces and matter extant and reckon with 
their properties. To direct and to guide them, to shape 
them — that is what we call creating. To arrange and to 
order the existing material, to generalise or to classify, 
to abstract mathematical formulas from the natural phe- 
nomena — that is what we call knowing, understanding, 
explaining. 

Our entire mental illumination is accordingly a formal 
procedure, a mechanical process. Just as in technical 
production the natural phenomena are bodily transformed, 
so should in science the transformation be done mentally. 
Just as production leaves the exaggerated craving for 
creation unsatisfied, so in the last instance science or 
" knowledge of Nature " leaves the exaggerated craving 
for causation unsatisfied. But as little as a reasonable 
man will deplore the circumstance that we need material 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 35I 

in order to produce and that out of nothing and of pious 
wishes nothing can be made, so little will anybody who 
has grasped the nature of knowledge wish to outrun the 
limits of experience. We want material both in order to 
know and to explain as well as in order to produce. 
Therefore no cognition can enlighten us as to where the 
material comes from or begins. That is : material is ante- 
cedent to thought. The phenomenal world or the mate- 
rial is the primary thing, the substance which has neither 
a beginning nor an end, nor an origin. The material 
exists and the existence is material (in the wider sense 
of the word), and the human faculty of knowledge or 
consciousness is a part of that material existence, which 
like all other parts can only exercise a definite, limited 
function, the cognition of Nature. 

When Schopenhauer wanted to have " introduced " to 
him the " whole company," he did not consider that the 
introduction is merely a ceremony and that every cere- 
mony of introduction presupposes an unknown company. 
Just as " introduction " can only take place in the world 
of men, so is cognition only possible in the world of ex- 
perience. The metaphysical impulse wishes to reverse 
that order, it wants to proceed with its knowledge beyond 
the nature of knowledge — to leave its own skin or to 
pull itself by its own hair out of the mire, like Miinch- 
hausen. It is only those whose ears still resound with 
the eternal music of religious flutes and who have, there- 
fore, no taste for the vicissitudes of the world, that can 
think of such a desperate undertaking. 

Lange has aptly remarked that the relation between 
names and things, the definitions have caused the phi- 
losophers an immense amount of trouble, but he does not 
notice that he himself is continually struggling in the 
same noose. Words or names denote always a whole 



352 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

genus of varieties. Blacks and Whites, Russians and 
Turks, Chinese and Laplanders are all included in the 
name of men. But as soon as a variety leaves its genus, 
as soon as it becomes more than formally different, its 
genus-name ceases. That is why no thing can proceed 
beyond its general nature, beyond its definition. Why 
should it be otherwise with the intellect? Does it, or does 
knowledge no longer belong to the phenomena, to the 
mundane things ? It is only where there are two worlds, 
one a perceptible world and the other a higher, a religious 
or metaphysical world, that one can believe in the higher 
nature or origin of consciousness. But in that case there 
is no reason why the impulse of the higher nonsense 
should be limited at all. Why should not tin, board and 
beef also be deified, along with cognition? It is the 
business of Socialists to show that also the last and the 
most subtle metaphysical residuum of " something 
higher " is only fit, together with the most antiquated 
ridiculous superstition, for the lumber-room. 



The world offers nothing but forms, changes or trans- 
formations. Those to whom that is not sufficient, should 
seek the eternal beyond the stars, as religion does, or 
beyond the phenomena, as philosophy does. The "criti- 
cal " philosophers, however, have faintly felt that what 
is thus being sought is a crazy notion which instruction 
has to remove from the head of man. They have, there- 
fore, given up the inquiry after the substance and turned 
their attention to the organ of inquiry, to the faculty of 
cognition. There they have worked quite critically. If 
formerly there dwelt something higher behind every 
bush and tree, it has now, — at least in authoritative 
circles — been driven to its last privacy, beyond the un- 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 353 

knowable atoms, beyond the still less knowable con- 
sciousness. 

It is there you find " the limits of cognition," and there 
is also the crazy notion. To emancipate oneself from it 
is the more difficult since the demands of the working 
class have driven our official scientists to pursue a con- 
servative, a reactionary policy. Now they show them- 
selves obdurate, they want to perpetuate the evil and go 
back beyond Kant, The late Lange might have landed in 
this company through error; but many of his successors 
are mere scamps who use the words of their prede- 
cessor as a good weapon against the new generation 
and thus compel us to carry the critique of Reason right 
to the very roots. 

Everything that one perceives, say the Neo-Kantians, 
can only be perceived through the spectacles of conscious- 
ness. Everything which we see, hear or feel, must come 
to us through the medium of sensation, that is, through 
our soul. Consequently, we cannot perceive the things 
in their purity, in their complete truth, but only in so far 
as they appear to us subjectively. According to Lange, 
"the sensations are the material from which the real 
eternal world is being built up. . . . The point in 
question can easily be defined. It is, to the successors of 
Kant, like the apple in the original sin, viz., The relation 
between the subject and the object in cognition" (Vol. 
11, p. 98.) 

Thus they shift their own sin to the shoulders of the 
post-Kantian philosophy. Let Lange speak for himself: 
"According to Kant, he says, our knowledge originates 
in the interaction of the two (subject and object), — a 
proposition infinitely simple, and yet invariably misin- 
terpreted. It follows from this view that our phenomenal 
world is not merely the product of our conception, but a 



354 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

result of objective actions and their subjective forma- 
tion. It is therefore not what an individual may perceive 
thus or otherwise according to his accidental mood or 
faulty organisation, but what mankind as a whole must 
perceive through its senses and Reason, that Kant calls in 
a certain sense objective. He called it objective in so far 
as we only speak of our experience; but it is transcen- 
dental, or to use another word, false, if we apply such 
knowledge to things in themselves, that is, to things which 
exist absolutely, independently of our knowledge." 

Here we have some of the brew stewed over again. It 
would still be tasty if it really were as homemade as it 
is apparently being served. If I did not know that be- 
hind the belief in transcendental objects there is hidden 
the source of all superstition I would not waste much 
time in drawing over-nice distinctions between the ordi- 
nary subjectivity as " it must be perceived by mankind 
through its senses and reason," and the higher objectiv- 
ity of " things in themselves," I would simply leave "the 
things which exist independently of our knowledge " till 
they become perceptible to it. Now, however, when I 
know that the above lines conceal the desire to proceed 
beyond the ordinary objects in order to arrive at the 
belief in transcendental objects, I smell distinctly that 
this brew has for its basis the old distinction between 
sacred and profane truth. At the back of the phenomena 
of the world there is, forsooth, something higher or mys- 
terious which our reason is too small, our intellect is too 
low to grasp, which we are unable to know even " for- 
mally," which, therefore, if we are not addicted to re- 
ligious belief, we must crave at least philosophically, 
transcendentally. 

Of course, the materialists have failed up to now to 
take account of the subjective element of knowledge and 






EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 355 

have accepted uncritically the perceptible objects as cur- 
rent coin. This error, forsooth, is now mended. 

Let us take the world as it is according to Kant, that 
is, as a mixture of subject and object; but let us keep to 
the fact that the whole world is one mixture, i. e., a unity ; 
let us also keep to the fact that this unity is dialectical, 
i. e., such as is made up of its opposite, of mixture or 
manifoldness. Well, there are in this manifoldness of the 
world things such as wood, stones, trees, clods of clay, 
etc., which are unquestionably called objects — I say 
" called " without as yet stating that they really are such. 
There are also things such as colors, odors, heat, light, 
etc., the objectivity of which is more questionable. Then 
there are others which recede still further, such as pains 
in the stomach, love and spring sensations, which are 
decidedly subjective. Finally there are things still more 
and by far the most subjective which are such in a super- 
lative degree, like moods, dreams, hallucinations, etc. 
Here we are at the salient point of the whole matter. 
Materialism has won its case if it has to be acknowl- 
edged that dreaming, though called subjective, is an 
actual, real thing. We are then ready to grant our crit- 
ical philosophers that wood and stones, — in short, all 
things which are decidedly called objects, are likewise 
perceived through the senses of vision and touch, that, 
consequently, they are not pure objects, but subjective 
things. We readily acknowledge that even the idea of a 
pure object or " thing in itself " is a squint-eyed idea 
which sees distortedly into another week of another 
world. 

The distinction between subject and object is a relative 
one. Both are of the same kind. They are two forms of 
one being, two individuals of one species. The subject 
of all predicates is called the natural process, actuality, 



356 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

empirical reality or existence. Who is there to deny 
that his accidental mood has the same true existence as 
the Mont Blanc, i. e., the quality of the existence of the 
two is the same, though the existence of the Mont Blanc 
is more universally accessible than that of the mood which 
only exists for the individual consciousness. It is enough 
that it is and that it belongs with all existence to the 
same category. Whoever wants a more detailed proof 
of the objective existence of his subjectivity has only to 
turn to Descartes who, as is well known, ascribed the 
most solid existence to cogito, to thinking, to conscious- 
ness. Idealism, the entire modern philosophy, which 
makes a special study of the subject-matter of cognition, 
lives and moves in the opinion that the intellect or the 
conscious, thinking being is the most evident of all 
evidences. " Sense of Self, self-consciousness," says 
Lazarus in his " Life of the Soul," — " that most difficult 
idea for physiologists, is as a matter of fact for every 
single individual, through his inner experience, the most 
certain, the most firm." Well, whether it is through the 
inner or external experience, it is sufficient for us, if it 
has to be admitted that the mind is an object of ex- 
perience. 

" The unification-tendencies of our Reason " require 
from the theologians and philosophers that they should 
recognise " something higher " or inconceivable. The 
same tendencies require from us that we should con- 
ceive heaven and earth, body and soul, atoms and con- 
sciousness as the manifold manifestations of one entity, 
as the manifold forms of one species, as the various predi- 
cates of one subject. The obscure inconceivableness or 
the inconceivable obscurity of philosophy finds its com- 
plete elucidation in the linguistical relationship between 
the subject and the predicate. The philologists have 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 357 

long since emphasised the unity of mind and speech. Of 
every predicate speech makes a subject and vice versa. 
The color is attached to the leaf, that means, is its predi- 
cate, the leaf is attached to the tree, the tree is attached 
to the earth, the earth to the sun, the sun, to the world 
and the world finally is the last entity or subject, the only 
substance which is attached to itself only, is no longer a 
predicate and has no thing above it. That which in the 
terminology of the grammar is called subject and 
predicate is elsewhere called matter and form. Stone is 
a matter; basalt or flint or marble are forms. But the 
stone-matter, too, is but a form of the inorganic, and 
the latter is a form of existence. The world is the entity, 
the matter, the " thing in itself " ; in relation to it every- 
thing else, thinking or knowing included, are predicates, 
phenomena or subjectivities. Thus the conceptions of 
subject and predicate, of matter and form, of entity and 
phenomenon interchange up to the largest and down to 
the smallest. Whatever we grasp with our faculty of 
cognition we grasp as part of a whole and a whole part. 
The understanding of this dialectics illuminates and ex- 
plains to perfection the mystical impulse to seek the truth 
beyond the outward appearance, that is, the subject be- 
hind every predicate. It is only through ignorance of the 
dialectical working of the mind that this impulse can 
proceed so far as to crave for a subject outside of the 
predicates, for a truth outside the phenomenon. A crit- 
ical epistemology must recognise the instrument of ex- 
perience itself as experience, in consequence of which 
any excursion beyond experience cannot even be dis- 
cussed. 

When now the modern philosophers with the historian 
of Materialism at their head come to us and say that the 
world offers but phenomena and these are the objects of 



358 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

cognition of Nature and the latter has only to do witb 
transformations, and desire to find a higher knowledge, 
an eternal, essential object, then it is clear that they are 
either knaves or fools who do not want to be satisfied 
with all grains of sand of the sand-heap, but look be- 
hind all the grains for an extra sand-heap without grains. 
Those who have to such an extent fallen out with the vale 
of tears of our phenomenal world, may with their im- 
mortal soul put themselves in a fiery chariot and go up 
to Heaven. But those who wish to remain in this world 
and believe in the salvation of the scientific knowledge 
of Nature, should study the materialist logic. Here it is 
stated: 

i. The intellectual kingdom is of this world only. 

2. The process which we call cognition, conception, 
interpretation must not and cannot do anything else but 
classify in genera and species this world of perceptible, 
interconnected existence. It must not and cannot prac- 
tice anything else but formal cognition of Nature. There 
is no other cognition than that. 

But here comes the man with the metaphysical impulse 
who is not satisfied with the " formal cognition," and 
wants to know in a different way which cannot at all be 
defined by him. It is not enough for him to classify the 
experienced phenomena with the assistance of the under- 
standing. What natural science calls science is to him 
but a surrogate, a poor, limited knowledge. He strives 
after an unlimited spiritualisation so that the things shall 
be resolved into pure intellect. Why cannot that dear 
impulse see that it puts forward an exaggerated demand r 
The world does not proceed from the spirit, but quite the 
reverse. Being is not a variety of intellect, but on the 
contrary, the intellect is a variety of the empirical ex- 
istence. Existence is the absolute, which is everywhere 






EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 359 

and eternal ; thinking is merely a special and limited form 
of it. 

If the philosopher perverts this simple fact, then it is 
no wonder that the world is to him a riddle. After hav- 
ing so perverted the relation between thinking and being 
that it contradicts reality, he naturally has to rake his 
brain over this " contradiction of thinking." But those 
who regard Reason as one of the natural things, as a 
phenomenon among and along with, other phenomena, 
will not require over and above " formal " science yet 
some higher foolish sort of knowledge; they will make 
the essence of things not knowledge, but life, the em- 
pirical material life of which knowledge constitutes only 
a part. Science or knowledge must not take the place 
of life ; life must not and cannot dissolve in science, since 
it is more comprehensive. That is why no single thing 
can be exhaustively mastered by knowledge or interpre- 
tation. No single thing is knowable entirely, a cherry no 
more than a sensation. Even when I have studied the 
cherry in accordance with all the demands of science, 
botanically, chemically, biologically, etc., I only know it 
truthfully after I have gone through its history, after I 
have touched it, seen it and swallowed it. The reader 
must understand that the distinction I draw here between 
knowledge and true knowledge is quite different from that 
which the metaphysicians draw. We may very well distin- 
guish between knowledge separated from life, such as is 
given in school, and the living knowledge which grows 
with and out of the material of experience. Science pre- 
supposes life and is conditioned on experience. This is 
what may be called rational. And if one seeks the rational 
in a different way, if one wishes to get pure, unconditioned 
knowledge, then he may just as well look out for square 
circles, or iron wood, or other similar nonsense. When- 



360 PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 

ever a person wishes to proceed beyond the natural limits 
of things — and the thing termed cognition is no excep- 
tion — he proceeds beyond the limits of language and 
reason, and black becomes white and reason unreasonable. 

The wretched philosophical criticism which prevails to- 
day represents the human mind as a poor beggar which 
can only explain the superficial phenomena of things. 
True knowledge is closed to it, the essence of things is 
considered inscrutable. In reply to that we may ask 
whether each thing has its special essence, whether there 
is an endless number of essences, or whether the whole 
world is but one single unity. Then it will be seen that 
our mind possesses the faculty to connect all things, to 
sum up all parts and to divide all sums. All the 
phenomena are constituted by the intellect as an entity, 
and all entities are recognised by it as phenomena of the 
great general entity of Nature. The contradiction be- 
tween phenomena and entity is not a contradiction, but a 
logical procedure, a dialectical formality. The essence 
of the Universe consists of phenomena and its phenomena 
are essential. 

From this point of view the metaphysical craving or 
the impulse to seek an entity behind every phenomenon 
may live and flourish so long as it recognizes the " formal 
cognition of Nature " as the only rational practice of 
science. The impulse to go beyond the appearance 
towards Truth and Essence is an excellent and scientific 
impulse. But it must not exaggerate ; it must know its 
limits. It must look for the sublime and divine amidst 
the earthly transiency ; it must not separate its truth and 
essences from the phenomenon '; it must only search after 
subjective objects, after relative truth. 

On that the old- and neo-Kantians are also agreed; 
we only disagree with the melancholy resignation, with 



EXCURSIONS INTO THE DOMAIN OF EPISTEMOLOGY 361 

the sad squint at a higher world with which they accom- 
pany their leaching. We do not agree that the " limits 
of cognition " should again become limitless by sending 
belief in search of an unlimited Reason. Their reason 
says : " Where there are phenomena, there must also be 
something transcendental which appears." And our 
critique says, The Something which appears is itself a 
phenomenon, the subject and the predicate are of the 
same species. 

With the light of cognition man illuminates all things 
of the world. In order that he may use it properly and 
avoid jugglery, it is necessary to know that the light of 
cognition is a thing like other things. Darwin's theory 
of the origin of species, which shows the gradual descent 
of one from the other, must also be applied here. The 
monistic conception of the world of the naturalists — the 
latter in the narrower sense of the word — is insufficient. 
And even if Haeckel should prove the " Perigenesis of 
the Plastidule " up to the hilt, even if the rise of the 
organisms from the inorganic should be demonstrated in 
the most evident manner, there will still remain the meta- 
physical loophole: the great opposition between mind 
and Nature. It is only through the dialectic-materialist 
theory of cognition that our conception becomes monistic. 
As soon as we only grasp the relation between subject 
and predicate in general, we cannot fail to see that our 
intellect is but a variety of form of the empirical reality. 
Materialism, it is true, has long since put forward that 
cardinal proposition, but it has remained a mere asser- 
tion, a mere anticipation. To establish it on a sure basis 
it is necessary to gain the general conviction that science 
altogether does not want and cannot want to accomplish 
more than the classification of the perceptible things ac- 
cording to species and varieties ; its entire desire and 



3&2 



PHILOSOPHICAL ESSAYS 



ability is confined to the mental reconstruction of the 
different parts of a differentiated unity. 

No doubt, in case of other objects not much is said 
of them when.it is proved that something belongs to the 
general order of things. One wishes to know something 
more specific than that, as for instance, whether it is 
organic or inorganic, whether matter or force, plant or 
animal, etc. : that it is natural, is here beyond dispute, 
but in the case of the mind, which for thousands of years 
has been the object of edification, of which people do not 
know how transcendentally they should extol it, a great 
deal is said when it is stated that it is but a variety, a 
form, a predicate of Nature, that it must be such since 
the linguistic unity of word and meaning admit of but 
one Nature. Just as necessarily as water is wet so neces- 
sarily has each thing which has a nature — and how can 
one conceive of anything which has no nature of some 
kind — the very same natural nature. The word and 
its meaning allow of no other nature. 

The savage makes a fetish of the sun, the moon and 
other things. The civilized nations have made a God of 
the mind, a fetish of the faculty of thinking. This must 
cease in the new society. There the individuals live in 
dialectical community: the many in unity; and the light 
of cognition will also have to moderate itself and be 
content with being a force among other forces, a tool 
among other tools. At the same time, however, it must 
claim that it is truly what it is. Human cognition has 
no cause to feel that disgracefully humble modesty which 
the Professors Nageli and Virchow wanted to ascribe to 
it. They have cunningly spoken of the limits of cog- 
nition, because the will-o'wisp of a " higher " unlimited 
cognition has been playing pranks with them in the 
metaphysical darkness. 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: Sept. 2004 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 16066 
(724) 779-21 1 1 



